PLANT-LORE OF SHAKESPEARE 
199 
raw, they engender all humourous and corruptible putrifactions 
in the stomacke, and cause fearful dreames, and if they be 
much used they snarre the memory and trouble the under¬ 
standing ” (“Haven of Health,” p. 58). 
The name comes directly from the French oignon , a bulb, 
being the bulb par excellence , the French name coming from 
the Latin unio , which was the name given to some species of 
Onion, probably from the bulb growing singly. It may be 
noted, however, that the older English name for the Onion 
was Ine, of which we may perhaps still have the remembrance 
in the common “ Inions.” The use of the Onion to promote 
artificial crying is of very old date, Columella speaking of 
“lacrymosa csepe,” and Pliny of “csepis odor lacrymosus.” 
There are frequent references to the same use in the old English 
writers. 
The Onion has been for so many centuries in cultivation 
that its native home has been much disputed, but it has now, 
“according to Dr. Regel (‘ Gartenflora,’ 1877, p. 264), been 
definitely determined to be the mountains of Central Asia. It 
has also been found in a wild state in the Himalaya Mountains.” 
■— Gardener's Chronicle. 
©range. 
(1) The count is neither sad nor sick, nor merry nor well; but civil count, 
civil as an Orange, and something of that jealous complexion. 
Much Ado About Nothing ; ii. 1, 303. 
(2) Give not this rotten Orange to your friend.— Ibid., iv. 1, 33. 
(3) I will discharge it either in your straw-coloured beard, your Orange- 
tawny beard .—Midsummer Night’s Dream, i. 2, 95. 
(4) The ousel cock so black of hue 
With Orange-tawny bill.— Ibid., iii. 1, 128. 
(5) You wear out a good wholesome forenoon in hearing a cause between 
an Orange-wife and a posset-seller.— Coriolanus, ii. 1, 77* 
