6 4 
PLANT-LORE OF SHAKESPEARE 
neat in growth, handsome in flower, of endless variety, and 
easy cultivation. There are also many varieties of the Cowslip, 
of different colours, double and single, which are very useful in 
the spring garden. 
Stabs, see Bpple. 
Crocus, see Saffron, 
Srow-jflowets. 
V* : 
There with fantastic garlands did she come 
Of Crow-flowers, Nettles, Daisies, and Long Purples. 
Hamlet , iv. 7, 169. 
The Crow-flower is now the Buttercup, 1 but in Shakespeare’s 
time it was applied to the Ragged Robin (Lychnis flos-cuculi ), 
and I should think that this was the flower that poor Ophelia 
wove into her garland. Gerard says: “They are not used 
either in medicine or in nourishment; but they serve for gar¬ 
lands and crowns, and to deck up gardens.” We do not now 
use the Ragged Robin for the decking of our gardens, not that 
we despise it, for it is a flower that all admire in the hedgerows, 
but because we have other members of the same family as easy 
to grow and more handsome, such as the double variety of the 
wild plant, Z. Chalcedonica , Z. Lcigascce , L.fulgens , Z. Haagena f 
&c. In Shakespeare’s time the name was also given to the 
Wild Hyacinth, which is so named by Turner and Lyte; but 
this could scarcely have been the flower of Ophelia’s garland, 
which was composed of the flowers of early summer, and not 
of spring. 
1 In Scotland the Wild Hyacinth is still called the Crow-flower— 
“ Sweet the Crow-flower’s early bell 
Decks Gleniffer’s dewy dell, 
Blooming like thy bonny sel, 
My young, my artless dearie, O.” 
Tannahill, Gloomy Whiter. 
