198 THE YOUNG 



wounds of cattle ; whilst the gardener 

 maintains it is equally efficacious in 

 the destruction of insect pests which 

 infest his flowers. Its active principle 

 known as digitaline is proved to be a 

 most potent and insiduous poison, 

 which requires to be used with the 

 most scrupulous care. It is chiefly 

 employed in affections of the heart, 

 for which organ it seems to have a 

 peculiar affinity and effect — it has been 

 known to lower the pulse of a man to 

 thirteen beats per minute. But its 

 most dangerous characteristic is its 

 power of accumulating in the system : 

 given in small and repeated dozes, with 

 apparently no injurious effects, it may 

 yet lurk in the body like a robber in 

 ambush, and unsuspectedly spring on 

 the patient with fatal suddenness. 

 Some whisper of this evil repute must 

 have influenced the compilers of the 

 language of flowers, who assigned to 

 such an elegant plant such meanings 

 as " insincerity " and "dissimulation." 



For such a strikingly beautiful 

 plant it has been only very sparingly 

 alluded to by the poets. Wordsworth 

 very accurately describes its appear- 

 ance in the latter stages of its growth — 



" When the foxglove, one by one, 

 Upwards through every stage of the tall 

 stem 



Had shed beside the public way its bells, 

 And stood of all dismantled, save the last 

 Left at the tapering ladder's top, that seem'd 

 To bend, as doth a slender blade of grass, 

 Tipp'd with a rain-drop." 



NATURALIST. 



One of its most ornamental sites of 



growth is graphically portrayed by 



another writer : — 



" I've lingered oft by rocky dells, 



Where streamlets wind with murmuring 

 din, 



And marked the fox-glove's purple bells 

 Hang nodding o'er the dimpled lin." 



One of the quaintest poetical conceits 



is that which represents Pan as seeking 



gloves for his mistress 



1 ' To keep her slender fingers from the sunne, 

 Pan through the pastures oftentimes hath 

 runne 



To pluck the speckled fox-gloves from 



their stem, 

 And on those fingers neatly placed them." 



And Cowley has also the same idea — 



" The foxglove on fair Flora's hand is worn, 

 Lest while she gathers flowers she meet a 

 thorn." 



At first sight the popular name of 

 foxglove seems most inappropriate and 

 incongruous, for not only do foxes not 

 wear gloves, any more than cats wear 

 mittens ; but even if reynard were to 

 don gloves, there is no obvious reason 

 why it should be associated with this 

 particular plant. Etymologists have 

 offered many solutions to the puzzle, 

 perhaps the most plausible of which 

 is that fox is a corruption of folks, 

 meaning the " good folks," or fairies, 

 which in the days of poesy and romance 

 peopled every green dell and sunny 

 bank. 



"The little folks, 

 So happy and so gay, amuse themselves 

 Sometimes with singing ..... 



