PLANT-LORE OF SHAKESPEARE 
7 
plants were well known in Shakespeare’s time, 1 and were 
grown in England, Turner and Gerard describe them as the 
Sea Houseleek; and Gerard tells us that they were grown as 
vegetable curiosities, for “ the herbe is alwaies greene, and 
likewise sendeth forth branches, though it remaine out of the 
earth, especially if the root be covered with lome, and now and 
then watered; for so being hanged on the seelings and upper 
posts of dining-roomes, it will not onely continue a long time 
greene, but it also groweth and bringeth forth new leaves,” 2 
anemone, 
By this, the hoy that by her side lay kill’d 
Was melted like a vapour from her sight, 
And in his blood that on the ground lay spilled, 
A purple flower sprung up chequer’d with white. 
Resembling well his pale cheeks, and the blood 
Which in round drops upon their whiteness stood. 
Venus and Adonis (h 65 ). 
Shakespeare does not actually name the Anemone, and I 
place this passage under that name with some doubt, but I do 
not know any other flower to which he could be referring. 
The original legend of the Anemone as given by Bion was 
that it sprung from the tears of Venus, while the Rose sprung 
from Adonis’ blood—• 
aL/j.a podoo TL/crei, ra Se dd/cpva rav ave/xdvav. 
Bion Idyll , i. 66, 
“Wide as her lover’s torrent blood appears 
So copious flowed the fountain of her tears; 
The Rose starts blushing from the sanguine dyes, 
And from her tears Anemones arise.” 
Polwhele's Translation , 1786, 
1 Three species are described in the fourteenth century treatise, “ Sinomina 
Bartholomew” 
2 In the emblems of Camerarius (No. 92) is a picture of a room with 
ap Aloe suspended. 
