FOREST- AND * STREAM. 



347 



ENGLISH NAMES OF WILD FLOWERS 

 AND PLANTS.* 



(Concluded. ) 



ALL first altempts at classification, etymological or other, 

 leave a margin of miscellaneous items refusing to be 

 ticketed or systmatized ; and there remain a few names falling 

 under none of the categories which I have cited, yet too in- 

 teresting to be omitted. Such is Apple, retaining its form in 

 the Teutonic, Celtic, Sclavonic, and Lettish languages, and 

 ipr.nging apparently from the Sanskrit ap, water, which re- 

 appears inverted in the Latin pa of Padua, po of Poto and Po- 

 #Mm, meaning therefore the water fruit or juice fruit. Such 

 again is Daffodil, the Daffadowndilly of Spenser and other 

 poets. It is a combination of sapharoun, or Saffron Lily, with 

 hsphodelus, the old English Affodilly. With the taste for 

 alliteration often shown in popular names the Sapharoun Lily 

 bhnding with the Affodilly become by a mutual compromise 

 Daffadowndilly, whence Daffodilly and Daffodil. Foxglove 

 is the Fox's-glew, or tintinnabulum, a ring of bells hung on a 

 an arched support. Bedstraw was a plant much used for 

 couches before mattresses were invented, and a species which 

 when dry yields a pleasant scent is still called Lady's Bedstraw. 

 Carnation is cjronation, its flowers being used as crowns or 

 Chaplets, just as Campion is champion, gathered to crown the 

 champions ina tournament. Cress is possibly from cross, its 

 jjetals being cruciate ; possibly from crescere, to grow, in token 

 of its rapid increase. It was used in Chaucer's time, under 

 the form of hers, to express any iusignificant quantity. 

 -or paramours ne raught he not a kers," 



from which comes, perhaps, the vulgar phrase, " I do not care 

 a curse," though a yet ruder parallelism has since been manu- 

 factured to confuse its spelling and its etymology. Nettle is 

 from ne, to spin, indicating that its coarse fibres were used 



iread in early times— an idea borne out by Hans Ander- 

 sen's beautiful tale of the wild swans, in which you remember 

 that the princess was permitted to redeem her brothers from 

 their transformation by weaving them shirts of Nettles. Sham- 

 rock is from an Erse word signifying the little. Trefoil. The 

 1 Story of its theological use by St. Patrick is of modern date, 

 and it has been taken by various writers to represent the 

 Watercress, the Wood Sorrel, the Dutch Clover, and the Black 

 Medick. irishmen are divided in the. present day between the 

 two last, which are sold on St. Patrick's Day both in London 

 and Dublin. The Snowdrop is so-called from its resemblance 

 ;o the large eardrops worn by ladies in the sixteenth century, 

 and represented often by painters of that period. The Tobacco 

 was the Indian name for the pipe in which the weed was 

 smoked, not of the weed itself ; and Potato belonged at first 

 to a tropical Convolvulus, and was transferred by mistake to 

 the well-known esculent. The Gooseberry was the cross-berry, 

 from its triple spine which frequently takes the form of a 

 cross. The Hollyhock is the cauli-hock; hock being an old 

 name for the Mallow, to whose order it belongs, and cauli, 

 meaning Cabbage, either from its lofty Cabbage like stalk, or, 

 •as in Cabbage Rose, with reference to its rich double bloom. 

 The Laburnum closes its petals at nightfall like a tired laborer , 

 and the Ozier is named from the oozy beds, which suit its 

 growth. 



I bring my list to an end,not because it is exhausted, but for 

 fear my hearers should become so. I have picked only the 

 most suggestive and curious of our many floral names, leaving 

 an abundant gathering to many gleaners. One branch of the 

 subject 1 have barely touched, the superstitious practices at- 



g to uiany of our wild plants, though not surviving in 

 their names. I have left alone the interesting question of 

 Bible plants, of the Hyssop, the Juniper, the Mustard-seed, 

 the Lilies of the field, the burning bush, the Shittah, the Al- 

 piug, the Gopher, the curiously mistranslated cab of dove's 

 dung, with the light thrown on their identity by the names 

 given to them in the commentaries in our older translations. 

 .Nor can I do more than hint at the rich store of li terary allusion 

 to our wild [lowers which abounds in all English poets, and 

 Liie beautiful thoughts suggested to many of them by some 

 particular plant. I should have liked to read you Chaucer's 

 liues upon the Daisy, Herrick's on the Daffodil, Burns' on the 

 Dog Kose, Shelley's on the Sensitive-plant, Southey's on the 

 Holly, Wordsworth's on the lesser Celandine, Longfellow's on 

 Compass-plant. I should like to open volume after volume 

 of Elizabethan and of later days— to enumerate and discuss 

 the flowers with which Ben Jonson bid us " Strew, strew the 

 smiling ground; "the ''pretty paunce and chevisaunce, "of Spen- 

 ser ; the " quiint enamelled eyes" that decked the laureate 

 hearse of Lycidas ; " the silver globes of Guilder Rose " which 

 won the heart of Cowper; the "Hawthorn bush beneath the 

 shade " of Goldsmith's lovers ; the " slight Hairbell " which 

 iraised its head, imcrushed by the airy tread of Ellen Douglas. 

 I should like to remind you of the lessons in natural theology 

 which Paley drew from the " little spiral body " of the Dod- 

 der seed ; of the star-shaped shadow of the Daisy which Archer 

 Butler showed to Wordsworth; or how Linureus, when he 

 first saw the wild Broom in flower — 



" Knelt, before it on the sod, 

 For its beauty thanking God." 

 Above all I should love to turn with you the page of Shakes- 

 peare, to read of the gray discrowned head of Lear wreathed 

 with " rank fumitera and f urrow weeds;" of Perdita at the 

 shearing feast, disparaging the streaked Gilliflowers as Nature's 

 bastards ; of poor distraught Ophelia distributing her Rose- 

 mary and Herb-of-grace ; of Puck telling how Love-in-idleness 

 was "purpled with love's wound ; of Titauia gently entwining 

 the 'female Ivy and sweet Honeysuckle" round the sleek 

 oth ass's head of Bottom; of Helena and Hermia, "a 



' Cherry seeming parted, two lovely berries moulded on 



em." For I should lay on you a spell mightier than I 

 eau forge myself — I should invoke allies before whom we all 

 bow as the ecource of our intellectual happiness and growth ; 

 I should remind you how the mo^t creative minds have drawn 

 nutriment from these tenants of our hedgerows and hill-sides, 

 nnd how the knowledge of their lore helps us in its turn to 

 interpret the sweet thoughts and apt illustrations of the poets 

 they inspired and delighted : how, if the aspirations of my 

 Cambridge botanist were fulfilled— if the Daisy could become 

 tin- bellia, the Strawberry the fragaria, the Honeysuckle the 

 oaprifolium, the Heather the caliuna, the parting genius of 

 romance and myth aud association and folk-lore would be 

 Bent sighing from the domain of botany, and the richest and 



* Laeture by Rev. W. Tucfcweil buiare ti» 8«a«Me»*Jui'» -Aj«U»o~ 



logical and Natural liiatary ?u«iety, 



most attractive of the natural sciences would become the dull- 

 est, and the most neutral. 



In conclusion, let me disclaim all merit of originality in the 

 ideas which have been put before you to-night. I have but 

 attempted to bring together, with the interest attaching to cu- 

 mulative illustration, conjectures which have been started and 

 discoveries which have been worked out by others. Scattered 

 through the old-fashioned tomes of Cole, Lyte, Parkinson- 

 through the pleasant, pages of Loudon, Pratt, Johns -, above 

 all, iu the most valuable work on popular botany which we 

 owe to our Somersetshire naturalist, Dr. Prior, you will find all 

 or nearly all that 1 have advanced. The flowers were plucked 

 by other hands ; mine has been only the pia dextera to sort and 

 wreathe them. — Nature. 



For Forest and Stream and Rod and Oun. 

 THE MOST PROFITABLE SHEEP. 



DIFFEBENOE BETWEEN SHEEP-MEAT AND MUTTON. 



Friend Hallock — If you will kindly make room in your ag- 

 ricultural department for a few additional remarks on sheep, 

 I will promise to have done with the subject. Which class of 

 sheep is the most profitable to the farmer ? is a query much 

 more easily made than answered. Indeed, the solution of the 

 problem depends on so many and such varied conditions, 

 such as climate, soil, locality and value of land, as to pre- 

 clude a definite answer. 



Under certain contingencies, the profits of sheep breeding 

 are derived solely from the increase of the flock and the an- 

 nual yield of wool ; but this, by far the most extensive branch 

 of sheep husbandly, is necessarily confined to such pastoral 

 countries as Texas, Colorado, California and New Mexico, 

 where, as yet, the shepherd can command free of all cost, and 

 all the year round, a perennial and unlimited range for hi? 

 flocks. Of course, in the older States, with a ruder climate 

 and a circumscribed range within inclosed high-priced lands, 

 it would be folly to dream of competing in the production of 

 wool with the boundless grass-covered plains of the Southwest, 

 which are free to all without limit and without price. 

 Hence wo are compelled in our sheep-breeding to look for our 

 piofits to the meat market rather than to the woollen mills, 

 and it is upon this particular branch of this great agricultural 

 industry that I propose to address you a few remarks. 

 Henry S. Randall, in his admirable letters on sheep husbandry, 

 tells us that in selecting a breed for any particular locality, we 

 must fake iuto consideration, first, the feed and climate, or the 

 surrounding natural circumstances; and, second, the market 

 facilities and demands. We should then make choice of that 

 breed which, with the advantages possessed, and under all the 

 circumstances, will yield the greatest net value of marketable 

 product. 



Rich lowland herbage, in a climate which allows it to re- 

 main green during a large portion of the year, i& favorable to 

 the production of large carcasses. If convenient to markets 

 where mutton finds a prompt sale and good prices, then all 

 the conditions are realized which call for a mutton, as contra- 

 distinguished from a wool-producing sheep. Under such cir- 

 cumstances, the choice should undoubtedly rest between the 

 improved English varieties — the Southdown, the New Leices- 

 ter, and the improved Cotserold or New Oxfordshire sheep. 

 In deciding between these, minor and more specific circum- 

 stances are to be taken into account. 



If we wish to keep large numbers, the Down will herd — 

 that is, remain thriving and healthy when kept together in 

 large numbers — much better than the two larger breeds. If 

 our feed, though generally plentiful, is liable to be shortish 

 during the droughts of summer, and we have not a certain sup- 

 ply of the most nutritious winter feed, the Down will better 

 endure occasional short keep. If the market calls for a 

 choice and high-flavored mutton, the Down possesses a de 

 cided superiority. If, on the other hand, we wish to keep but 

 few in the same inclosure, the large breeds will be as healthy as 

 the Downs. If the pastures be wettish or marshy, the former 

 will better subsist on the rank herbage which usually grows 

 in such situations. If they do not afford so fine a quality of 

 mutton, they, particularly the Leicester, possess an earlier ma- 

 turity, and both give more meat for the amount of food con- 

 sumed, and yield more tallow. Doubtless, my dear Hallock, 

 you, as a discriminating and traveled gourmet who have 

 enjoyed the tid-bits from the most succulent flesh-pots of both 

 hemispheres ; who, like our friend Charles Hutchinson, are an 

 ardent disciple of the great Savarin, and whose dictum like that 

 of the illustrious Mr. Sam Ward can make or mar the fortunes 

 of aspiring cooks, have more than once deplored the general ab- 

 sence of good, ripe muttonfrom our American tables. Does not 

 the water come into your mouth as you remember, withfondre- 

 gret and perchance covetous longing, the magnificent mutton 

 of old England ; the juicy haunch from a four-year old black 

 face, fattened on those Grampian Hills where erst the young 

 Norval tended Ins father's flocks, or the delicious saddle, 

 marbled with lean and fat of a ripe wedder, South-Down 

 grazed upon the breezy down of Hampshire ? Such mutton 

 as our friend Jim Sanderson, of festive memory, was wont to 

 serve at the Langham ? Or, better still, the incomparable and 

 super-delicious of Wales, fatted on the thymy and aromatic 

 pastures of grand Old Snowdon. Oh ! why is it, that save a 

 saddle imported from England or Canada ready dressed, we 

 can get no such meat in your good city of Gotham ? And who 

 is responsible for this sad privation? First, the breeder, whose 

 uneducated palate leads him to sacrifice quality to quantity, and 

 flnvor to fatness, and who,iu his barbarous ignorance, fancies the 

 coarse-grained fat and tallowy carcass of a Cotserold makes as 

 good mutton as four-year-old Southdown, and who accordingly 

 breeds his native ewes to these large breeds, and drives the pro- 

 duce to market while the meat is yet pale and flavorless from 

 immaturity. But it is not the farmer alone who is to blame 

 in this matter. The butcher is equally criminal, except when 

 he palms off yearling meat for spring lamb, or dresses a lean 

 catcass with the fat from another sheep. He has no regard 

 whatever to the age of the animal which he slaughters, pro- 

 vided always that he finds a profit in it. But the unpardon- 

 able sin of the butcher is that he wdl as often as not slaughter 

 sheep while its stomach is yet more or less filled with un- 

 digested food, hence that' horrible sheep — erroneously called- 

 wool-taste so common in New York mutton. 



Speaking of this atrocity to Mr. Reybold, the famous peach- 

 grower and sheep-breeder of Delaware, he explained the cause 

 of this wooly taste very clearly. " If," said he, " there be 

 even as much as a handful of undigested food in the stomach 

 of a sheep when slaughtered, it immediately enters into fer- 

 mentation, and the gases so generated within an incredibly 

 short time pervade the whole of the flesh, and imparts to it 

 that tahit vulgarly called the. "taste of the wool." Here is ahint 

 to young sportsmen— old ones don't require it— never fail to 



eviscerate any furred game which you may kill before it gets 

 cold. 



But, admit you by chance get a prime saddle of mutton, 

 what becomes of it? In nine cases in ten you clap it into on« 

 of those infernal cast iron contrivances called a cooking-range, 

 from which it is withdrawn a sodden mass of baked meat 

 utterly deprived of that divine osrhazomo which should be the 

 diet in the next world of all great culinary artists, as a reward 

 for the good they have done in this. 



Though doubtless there are many exceptions, I never have 

 met, in the whole course of my experience at the North, but 

 two gentlemen who fed and slaughtered their own mutton; but 

 then they were accomplished, traveled men, with palates 

 educated to distinguish between sheep-me.it and mutton 

 Thrice blessed are they who have tasted the five-year-old 

 Southdown mutton of Mr. AVebster, at Marshfield, and the 

 succulent grade mutton of Mr. Edwin Thorne, at Thorndale. 

 In the Southern States it was di fferent, or rather was far different 

 in the ante helium days. Good mutton at the watering-places, 

 in the mountains and on the plantations of Maryland and Vh- 

 ginia, was the rule and not the exception, aud this was natural 

 because the mutton producers were large landed gentry, with 

 educated palates, who abominated patent cooking stoves, and 

 who competed with each other as eagerly in the production 

 of good mutton as they did for the brush in a fox chase or a 

 prize on the road track or cock-pit. 



Who that ever visited the Berkley Springs, in Morgan 

 County, Virginia, does not retain an appreciative remembrance 

 of the mutton, bred and fattened at the Bower, the famous 

 Dandridge estate in Western '- irginia, and buried in ice for 

 days before being served on the table, roasted before a 

 quick wood fire, with that consummate judgment which the 

 experience of years alone can give to old AuntDinah or Polly ' 

 the sable divinities of the kitchen? 



And who, who has ever tasted it, can forget the mutton of 

 the Eastern Shore of Maryland, bred by a Lloyd or a Charley 

 Tilgbman, slaughtered by a Turner, and served at the Mary- 

 land Club, with Otto Williams in the chair, with Jim Carroil 

 on his right hand and Harry on his left ! F. G. S. 



MUSHROOMS AGAIN. 



WE have in this country (England), many species that 

 are more or less fit for food, but owing to the im- 

 perfect knowledge which the generality of people possess re- 

 specting them, tliey are for the ni09t part neglected. Fungi 

 are much used as food in Australia by the natives, and kanga- 

 roos are said to search for and devour them with avidity, while 

 in Terra del Fuego a species of Cyttaria ( O.Darwinu) forms the 

 most substantial food of the natives during lengthened periods. 

 In Northern Europe many different species of Fungi form a 

 staple article of daily food. In Norway, Sweden and Russia 

 species that are here considered either poisonous or worthless 

 are there preserved in large, quantities for use during severe 

 and protracted winters. Among the kinds most used for focd 

 in Northern Europe we may instance various Agaries, as A. 

 delieiosus A. Hossula and A. melleus. Three or four species 

 of Boletus are also regularly eaten in large quantites. In Rus- 

 sia all the edible species, and many which we regard, as a 

 rule, as unwholesome, are either grilled with butter and oil, 

 or boiled in water, and then preserved for several months in 

 vinegar, highly seasoned with pepper and other condiments. 

 This last plan is a tolerably safe one for testing questionable 

 species. Tons of edible mushrooms are annually dried in 

 ovens for winter supply in Northern Europe, where gigantic 

 pine forests furnish ample supplies. We are, therefore, much 

 behind our neighbors as regards the conversion of fungi into 

 wholesome food. The only kinds at present used either in 

 this country or in France are the common field mushroom 

 (Agaricus campestris), horse mushroom {A. arventim),Tmfile 

 (Tuber mtivum) Morel, (Morahella escuknta), and occasionally 

 Agarieuspe?-sonatu,s. In addition to these we have repeatedy 

 eaten the vegetable beefsteak ( FistwUna hepatica), a fleshy para- 

 site on the common Oak, the grav3 r from which, is most deli- 

 cious ; the taste of the Fungus itself, however, more resem- 

 bles that of a bullock's liver'tlmn a juicy steak. Agaricus pro- 

 cerus, the parasol or partridge-breasted mushroom, with ita 

 near ally A. rachodes, we have repeatedly eaten stewed iu 

 milk, much to the horror of our f riends. Although both are 

 superior to the best cultivated mushrooms as regards delicacy 

 and flavor. The pretty little fairy -ring champignon (Maras- 

 mius oreades) often found abundantly in pastures, is one of the 

 best of all the edible kinds, either when eaten fresh, or when 

 dried for stows and soups. In addition to these we have Bole- 

 tus ednlis, B. scaber, B. tlavus, Gigantic Puff-ball (Lywperdon, 

 gigantewri), Cantharellus cibarius, Lactarius deliciosus and 

 Hydnum repandum, besides many others less generally known 

 as respects their esculent qualities. In recommending Fungi 

 as food-plants, we have to contend against two of the greatest 

 obstacles to progress — ignorance and deeply-rooted prejudice : 

 but we hope yet to see the time when bothgood and bad Fungi 

 will be better known than at present. In selecting Fungi fcr 

 food the recent cases of poisoning show that caution must bo 

 exercised, or unpleasant consequences may be the result. Nev- 

 ertheless, most of the species which we have named are easily 

 recognized without any special knowledge, and they are all 

 not only palatable but iu many cases, when nicely cooked, 

 delicious. It is perhaps too much to expect that elementary 

 lessons on botany should be given in our schools, but it seems 

 an oversight to send youngsters adrift without any knowledge 

 of our commonest food-producing plants. Our best authorities 

 agree thatedible Fungi possess nutritious properties iu a very 

 high degree, audit is to be regretted that valuable food should 

 be lost in large quantities, simply because we lack the knowl- 

 edge necessary for its collection and utilization.— The Garden, 

 London, JSng, 



Peeskevation of Forests.— TheForest Association of Chi- 

 cago has presented memorials to both Congress aud the Senate, 

 advising the appointment by those bodies of a competent com- 

 mission to proceed to Europe and examine the forestry regu- 

 lations of the different countries there. The dbject is the 

 adoption of such of the European legislation as may be em. 

 ployed in our own country for the preservation and cultivation 

 of American forests. The matter has been referred to the 

 Committee on Agriculture. It is to be hoped that the present 

 movement may not be confined to the committee rooms. The 

 statistics contained in the last number of Scribner's incident- 

 ally referred to by us last week, together with others equally 

 suggestive, should contain sufficient warning to insure some 

 effective action in the matter on the part of our legislators; 



