PLANT-LORE OF SHAKESPEARE 
213 
Pear tree, with its curiously roughened bark, its upright, tall, 
pyramidal shape, and its sheet of snow-white blossoms, is a 
lovely ornament in the old gardens and lawns of many of our 
country houses. It is by some considered a British tree, but 
it is probably only a naturalized foreigner, originally introduced 
by the Romans. 
lpeas. 
(1) Ceres, most bounteous lady, thy rich leas 
Of Wheat, Rye, Barley, Vetches, Oats, and Pease. 
Tempest , iv. 1, 60. 
(2) Peas and Beans are as dank here as a dog. 
1st Henry IV, ii. 1, 9. ( See Beans.) 
(3) This fellow picks up wit, as Pigeons Pease. 
Love's Labour s Lost, v. 2, 315. 
(4) I had rather have a handful or two of dried Peas. 
Midsummer Night's Dream, iv. 1, 41. 
(5) That a shealed Peascod?— King Lear, i. 4, 219. 
(6) I remember the wooing of a Peascod instead of her. 
As You Like It, ii. 4, 51. 
(7) Not yet old enough to be a man, nor young enough for a boy; as a 
Squash is before ’tis a Peascod, or a Codling when ’tis almost an 
Apple. — Twelfth Night , i. 5, 165. 
(8) Well, fare thee well ! I have known thee these twenty-nine years 
come Peascod time.— 2nd Henry IV, ii. 4, 412. 
(9) How like, methought, I then was to this kernel, 
This Squash, this gentleman. — Winters Tale , i. 2, 159. 
(10) Peascod, Pease-Blossom, and Squash —Dramatis persons in Mid¬ 
summer Night's Dream. 
There is no need to say much of Peas, but it may be worth 
a note in passing that in old English we seldom meet with the 
word Pea. Peas or Pease (the Anglicized form of Pisum ) is 
the singular, of which the plural is Peason. “ Pisum is called 
in Englishe a Pease ; ” says Turner— 
“ Alle that for me thei doo pray, 
Ilelpeth me not to the uttermost day 
The value of a Pese.” —The Child of Bristowe, p. 570. 
