314 



THE NATURALIST. 



will raise a blister. In other climates, however, this acridity diminishes, 

 and in Siberia the berries are given to children as a remedy for hooping- 

 cough. The advocates of total abstinence must look on Mezereon as one of 

 their allies, for quaint old Gerarde tell us that ' if a drunkard do eat one 

 graine or berry of this plant, hee cannot be allured to drinke any drinke at 

 that time ; such will be the heat of his mouth, and choking in the throat.' 

 The leaves are of a delicate green, and appear after the flowers at the top of 

 the stem ; they soon, however, drop off, leaving the bright scarlet berries 

 alone on the stalks, presenting an appearance more brilliant than the flowers 

 which preceded them. Many species of Daj^hiie are cultivated in our 

 gardens and greenhouses : D. odorata, with exquisitely scented blossoms, 

 which grow to a large size in Devonshhe : D. pontica and D. Cneorum are 

 perhaps the most generally known ; the latter, an elegant species with trailing 

 stems, is reported to have been found at the foot of Snowdon, but some error 

 is to be suspected, as no one but its supposed discoverer has ever seen it 

 there. D. Laureola, however, is an undoubted British plant, and may be 

 found sjDaringly in most of the woods in this neighbourhood. In cultivation, 

 as in the Park, it attains a large size ; the blossoms are pale green, with 

 yellow stamens, and fragrant ; the leaves, unlike those of D. Mezerewn, are 

 persistent, that is, do not drop off at the approach of winter ; the berries, 

 when ripe, are black. Its flowers expand in January and February. It is 

 known by the names of Wood Laurel and Spurge Laurel. The celebrated 

 vegetable lace of Jamaica is the produce of a shrub nearly allied to the 

 Mezereon, the Lagetta lintearia. The inner bark is formed of as many as 20 

 or 30 laminse or layers of a substance of a very fine gauzy texture, of which 

 caps and other articles of clothing have been made. The Lily of the Yalley 

 { Convallaria majalis ) is of course too familiar to us to need any description. 

 It is found sparingly in a wild state in most of the English and Scottish 

 counties, and though a favourite border flower, is undoubtedly a native. 

 The bright scarlet berries which succeed the blossoms are not so generally 

 known. The root is considered good to apply to bruises, while that of a 

 near ally, the Solomon's Seal, " taketh away in one night, or two at the 

 xnost, any bruise, blacke or blew spots gotten by falls of women's wilfulnesse, 

 in stumbling upon their hasty husbands' fists.' The specimen exhibited 

 w^as gathered last May, in a wood near West Wycombe, where it grows in 

 ;some plenty : it is also reported from woods near Booker and Hughenden, but 

 I have searched the latter neighbourhood in vain. In some parts of Lincoln- 

 ^hiroj where this Lily is plentiful, annual excursions called ' Lilying parties ' 



