For alas ! alas ! there’s a deadly spell 
Conceal’d thy leaves among, 
And’t is meet thou shouldst leave bright mead and dell, 
Where duly at eve the wild birds swell 
To more innocent flowers their song; 
Be the raven’s croak from the blasted tree, 
And the owlet’s scream thy lullaby. 
Yet, ere thou depart, let thy graceful wreath 
For one moment be lightly flung 
Round the mirror of Beauty, to show her beneath 
What is lovely and bright lurk the seeds of death 
And, despite bland Flattery’s tongue, 
She might learn this lesson for after-hour, 
That beauty alon6 is a worthless dower. 
The procuring this plant was considered a most hazardous undertaking; 
for, on being dislodged from its bed, it was said to utter shrieks and 
groans, and whoever was within hearing died, or became mad. Shakspeare 
alludes to this notion in “ Romeo and Juliet: ” — 
“ Torn out of the earth, 
That living mortals, hearing them, run mad.” 
And in “ Henry the Sixth: ” — 
“ Would curses kill, as doth the mandrake’s groan, 
I would invent as bitter searching terms. 
As curst, as harsh, as horrible to hear.” 
« The reported mode of uprooting it,” says Drummond, “ was to fasten 
the tail of a dog by cords to the bottom of the stem, and then the animal 
was whipped, until by his struggles the plant was dragged from the 
earth, while the persons who directed this operation had their ears filled 
with pitch, lest they should hear the fatal groan. The dog, of course, fell 
dead at the same time, or soon after.” 
G 4 
