cv.— THE ORPINE. 
Sedum Telephium Linne. 
T he large genus Sedum can be conveniently subdivided by the colour of the 
petals, which may be yellow, white, or red. The apparent etymology of the 
name Orpine suggests a doubt as to whether it was not originally applied to one of 
the yellow-flowered species and not to Sedum Telephium Linn6. A favourite 
mediaeval yellow pigment was a sulphide of arsenic known phonetically as orpiment 
{auri pigmentum)^ and this name seems in France to have been transferred to the plant 
as Orpin. It is amusing to find the many corruptions which have arisen among our 
country-folk from the attempt to rationalise what they do not understand. The 
meaningless Orpies or Arpent becomes Orphan John, Harping Johnny, or Alpine, 
hive-long, on the other hand, is a thoroughly comprehensible name, referring to 
that great vitality which, as we have seen, is in varying degrees characteristic of the 
whole Family, and connected, as is also the name Midsummer Men, with the use of 
the plant In divination, half playful, half superstitious. The poet Spenser speaks of 
it as “ Orpine, growing still ” ; and Gerard says, “ This plant is very full of life,” and 
proceeds to paraphrase Dodoens on the subject. In Lyte’s translation of Dodoens’s 
“ Herball ” (1578) it is stated that — 
“ The people of the country delight much to set it in pots and shelles on Midsomer even, or upon timber slattes or 
trenchers dawbed with clay, and so to set or hang it up in their houses, whereas it remayneth greene a long season and 
groweth, if it be sometimes over-sprinkled with water.** 
John Stow in his “ Survey of London,” which was published almost 
simultaneously with Gerard’s “ Herbal,” writes : — 
On the vigil of St. John Baptist, every man*s door being shadowed with green birch, long fennel, St. John*s wort, 
orpin, white lilies, and such like, garnished upon with garlands of beautiful flowers, had also lamps of glass, with oil burning in 
them all the night.’* 
John Parkinson, another Londoner, writing nearly half a century later, but 
quoting the sixteenth-century writer Tragus, says in his “ Theatrum Botanicum ” 
(1640) 
“ The leaves are much used to make Garlands about Midsommer with the come Marigold-flowers put upon strings to hang 
them up in their houses, upon bushes and May-poles, &c. Tragus sheweth a superstitious course in his country, that some 
use after Midsommer day is past, to hang it up over their chamber doores, or upon the walles, which will be fresh and greene at 
Christmas, and like the Aloe spring and shoote forth new leaves, with this perswasion, that they that hanged it up, shall feele 
no disease so long as that abideth greene.** 
Even to this day a similar playful superstition is sometimes practised at Rio de 
Janeiro with the bud-bearing leaves of the allied Bryophyllum which are given to a 
departing friend to hang up in his cabin and bring him good luck as long as they 
continue to sprout. 
The bonfires in honour of Baal, the sun-god, no longer blaze on our hill-tops 
at the Summer Solstice ; but we should not be surprised to learn that the use of 
Orpine for love-divination still lingers in some remote country parts. 
