THE FRITILLARY— continued. 
many localities it has been partially or completely exterminated by being transferred 
to gardens. It generally flourishes in alluvial meadows liable to inundation ; but we 
once found a plant in a wood of wild hyacinths, thirty or forty feet above the water- 
level, where its seed had, perhaps, been carried by birds. 
Few of the floral charms of spring are more delightful than the sight of scores 
or hundreds of these gay bells swaying in the breeze of a May morning ; and the 
species is very accommodating in garden cultivation, as it may be naturalised in 
grass, in a well-watered rock-garden, or in the peaty soil under Rhododendrons. 
The fifty species of the genus are all, in fact, natives of North Temperate regions 
and present no difficulty in cultivation, though some of them have small green or 
brownish blossoms which are, perhaps, more curious than beautiful. 
Dodoens called our British species Flos Meleagris , the name Meleagris being then 
that of the guinea-fowl, the sisters of the Argonaut Meleager having, according to 
Greek legend, been turned into guinea-fowl. As Gerard put it : — 
“One square is of a greenish yellow colour, the other purple, keeping the same order as well on the backside of the 
flower as on the inside, although they are blackish in one square, and of a violet colour in another : in so much that every 
leafe seemeth to be the feather of a Ginnie hen, whereof it tooke his name.” 
As alternative names Gerard uses “Turkey-hen flower” and “Chequered 
Daffodil,” while Parkinson calls it “Chequered Lily.” Turkey-hen flower has been 
corrupted into the rather happy “Turkey-eggs” and the meaningless “Turk’s-head,” 
which are still in use, and is probably also the origin of the Minety name 
“ Toads’-heads.” The discontinuous distribution of the species may partly explain 
the very local character of some of its names. At Dinton, near Aylesbury, for 
instance, it is called “ Crowcup,” and at no great distance “ Froccup” (which is 
probably Frog Cup, and may apply equally to the situations in which the plant grows 
and to its spotted flowers) is the common name. “ Snake’s-head ” or “ Snake’s-head 
Lily ” are somewhat widely distributed names. The Cumberland garden name 
“Deith Bell” may, or may not, be old; but the most interesting of all its appellations 
are “Lazarus Bell” and “Leopard’s Lily” in use near Crediton. These, no doubt, 
were originally “ lazar’s bell” or “ leper’s lily,” and refer to the small bells that lepers 
were bound to wear to give warning of their approach. 
Lobel gave the plant the name of Fritillaria , which Linne adopted, from the 
Latin fritillus, a dice-box, apparently by a sort of metonymy for a chequer-board, and 
this name is, of course, used in a similar sense for a well-known group of butterflies 
with wings of chequered black and brown. 
While the erect capsule favours the dispersal of the seed, the pendent flower 
serves to protect both pollen and honey. At the same time, the blossoms may be 
cross-pollinated by any hovering insect, though probably mainly by bees. 
