THE GREATER CELANDINE— continued. 
darke blewish greene colour on the upper side, like unto Colombines, and more pale 
blewish greene underneath.” Deeply pinnatifid with four or six lateral lobes and a 
larger terminal one, they have all their lobes rounded and bluntly lobed, the lateral 
segments being prolonged downwards. 
In ancient times, however, it was probably the bright orange latex with its acrid 
bitter taste and fetid smell, which flows copiously from any part of the brittle plant 
if it be broken, that most attracted notice. The bright green of the young leaves in 
April may have originally given the plant the name of Chelidonium or Swallow-wort, 
from the Greek ^eXt8wi^, cheUdon^ a swallow ; but at some very early period a legendary 
explanation seems to have attached itself to the name. Aristotle gives the story, 
which is copied by Dioscorides, Pliny, and the herbalists of the Renaissance. 
Pliny says : — 
“The brute animals have been the discoverers of certain plants : among them we will name Chelidonia first of all. It is 
by the aid of this plant that the swallow restores the sight of the young birds in the nest, and even, as some people will have 
it, when the eyes have been plucked out.” 
The story may have originated in a misunderstanding of the nictitating 
membrane or inner eyelid present in birds and reptiles ; but it is only fair to the old 
students of Nature to mention that Aristotle admits that young birds will “ recover 
their sight of themselves in time, without anything being applied to them ” ; and 
that both Dioscorides and Pliny give the alternative explanation of the name 
Chelidonium that the plant blossoms at the coming of the swallows and withers at the 
season of their departure. Parkinson tells of a further misunderstanding, arising 
from ignorance of Greek, that 
“The Chimists in former times called the greater kinde Coeli donum ,* and thereupon did highly extoll the Quintessence 
drawne from it, not only to cxpell many diseases, but for many of their idle and fantasticke transmutations.” 
Possibly the German name Goldwurz may be connected with this notion. 
The acrid character of the juice, no doubt, suggested its external use under the 
name of Tetter-wort for skin diseases ; but it is dangerously narcotic if taken 
internally. The modern physiological explanation of the fetid latex is that it may 
protect the plant from being browsed by animals. 
The four yellow petals of the flowers — which are borne in loose umbels on 
slender hairy stalks — suggest a member of the Family Cruciferde^ a suggestion which 
is strengthened by the long pod-like fruits, but is at once dispelled when it is seen 
that there are but two sepals, that there are about thirty stamens, and that there is 
no partition down the interior of the fruit. 
The presence of a white stalk or raphe adherent at first down the side of the 
small black seed is also noteworthy. 
