THE YOUNG 



NATURALIST. 



175 



Prance, although it is popularly spoken 

 of as lilies. The legend of its adoption 

 is that when Clovis was on his way to 

 be baptised at Eheims he received a 

 lily from heaven, and that Louis-le- 

 Jeune adopted the celestial flower on 

 the national standard. At first they 

 were scattered numerously on the field 

 of the banner, but the number was 

 ultimately reduced to three in honour 

 of the Trinity. Various other inter- 

 pretations have been given of the pecu- 

 liar heraldic device of Trance, as that 

 it represents halberd heads, or frogs, 

 hence Frenchmen are called crapauds, 

 or toads ; by others they are supposed 

 to be bees, because gold bee ornaments 

 were found in the tomb of Childeric, 

 the father of Clovis ; but these are now 

 believed to have been horse trappings, 

 and no part of the regal adornment. 

 Whatever may have been the origin of 

 the French emblazonment, it is now 

 well known as the Fleur-de-lys, and 

 has given the popular name of Flower- 

 de-luce to the Iris. This is very evi- 

 dently a corruption of Fleur-de-Clovis, 

 which is equivalent to Louis, the uni- 

 versal French Christian name. The 

 fleur-de-lys was chosen by Flavio Gioja 

 to mark the north pole on the card of 

 the mariner's compass out of compli- 

 ment to the then King of Naples, who 

 was of French extraction. When 

 England's king claimed sovereignty of 

 France, the fleur-de-lis formed part of 

 his armorial bearings, hence Shakspeare 



says : — 



" Cropp'd are the flower-de-luces in your 

 arms ; 



Of England's coat one-half is cut away." 

 In the north of England and Scotland 

 the leaves of the iris are known as 

 " skegs" or " seggs i" this name is an 

 evident descendant of the Saxon 

 "sceax," a knife or sword, and is 

 very appropriately applied to the sword- 

 like leaves of the iris. 



The generic name iris is the Greek 

 name for the rainbow and was anciently 

 applied to this genus from the varied 

 and beautiful colours of its flowers. 

 From a similar variability of colour a 

 portion of the eye surrounding the 

 pupil is called the iris, and the old 

 herbalists putting the two things 

 together attributed great virtue to a 

 decoction of the iris for curing weak- 

 ness and watering of the eyes. 

 According to some authorities " iris" 

 originally meant the eye. In the 

 Greek mythology we know that Iris 

 was the messenger of the gods and 

 therefore often sent to them to settle 

 matters, hence the name has been 

 derived from a Greek word meaning to 

 settle, and as the rainbow was the 

 harbinger of peace to man, the name 

 was appropriated to it. The Gaelic 

 name for the iris is also equivalent 

 to the name for the rainbow. 



The specific name pseud-acorns means 

 the false acorus, a name now applied 

 to the sweet flag, acorus calamus an 



