TANSY. 



Tanacetum vulgare. Nat. Ord., Composite. 



LL our readers will probably at 

 once recognise the subject of 

 our present illustration, for the 

 tansy is one of our most generally 

 distributed plants, being met with 

 all over the country. It will be 

 found springing up on the broad 

 strip of waste land that so often 

 borders our country roads, or it 

 may often be seen at the edges of 

 fields. The height of the tansy, 

 varying from eighteen inches to a 

 yard, tends to make it conspicuous, 

 and the bright golden flower-heads 

 that crown the plant at once at- 

 tract the eye. The flowers are 

 almost at the summit, not run- 

 ning down the sides of the stem, 

 and they should be looked for at the end of July, during 

 August, and in the beginning of September. It is one of 

 the attractive flowers of the waste lands. 



Our present name tansy and the French tanaisie are 



both corruptions of the mediaeval Latin name Athanasia, 



which was itself derived from the Greek words a, not, and 



thanatos, death, i.e. immortality. This plant was held in 



60 



