84 THE BOOK OF HERBS 



The pleasure is fine, 

 The profit is thine. 

 Keep colour in drying, 

 Well used, worth buying. 



And also : — 



Pare SuiTron between the two St Mary's days ' 

 Or set or go shift it, that knoweth the ways . . . 

 In having but forty foot, workmanly dight 

 Take Saffron enough for a lord or a knight. 



jiugusi's HusbanJty. 



From old records it seems to have been grown in 

 small patches of less than an acre, and to have been 

 a most profitable crop. " I. W.," in his directions says, 

 for drying it, " a small kiln made of clay, and with a 

 very little Fire, and that with careful attendance," is 

 required. " Three Pounds thereof moist usually making 

 one of dry. One acre may bear from seven to fifteen 

 Pound, and hath been sold from 20s. a Pound to ;£^ a 

 Pound." The last price sounds as if it existed only in his 

 imagination, and one cannot really think that it was given 

 often ! But on one occasion, Timbs says, an even higher 

 sum was reached, for when Queen Elizabeth paid a visit 

 to Saffron Walden, the Corporation paid five guineas 

 for one pound of Saffron to present to her. Though 

 this was exceptional, the usual prices for it were very 

 high ; and to show this, and also the enormous amount 

 that was used in cooking. Miss Amherst quotes from 

 some old accounts of the Monastery of Durham : " In 

 1531, half a pound of 'Crocus' or Saffron was bought 

 in July, the same quantity in August and in November, 

 a quarter of a pound in September, and a pound and a half 

 in October." So much for the quantity ; as to the price, 

 a merchant of Cambridgeshire charged them in 1539- 

 1540 for 6| lbs. Crocus, £"], 8s. 



Saffron used to be much employed to colour and to 

 flavour pies and cakes, and it was this reason that Perdita 

 sent the " Clown" to fetch some, when she was making 



' July 22nd and August 15th. 



