PLANT-LORE OF SHAKESPEARE 
253 
“ For no man at the firste stroke 
He may not felle down an Oke ; 
Nor of the Reisins have the wyne 
Till Grapes be ripe and welle afyne.” 
Romaunt of the Rose. 
The best dried fruit were Raisins of the sun, i. e. dried in 
the sun, to distinguish them from those which were dried in 
ovens. They were, of course, foreign fruit, and were largely 
imported. The process of drying in the sun is still the method 
in use, at least, with “ the finer kinds, such as Muscatels, which 
are distinguished as much by the mode of drying as by the 
variety and soil in which they are grown, the finest being dried 
on the Vines before gathering, the stalk being partly cut 
through when the fruits are ripe, and the leaves being removed 
from near the clusters, so as to allow the full effect of the sun 
in ripening.” 
The Grape thus becomes a Raisin, but it is still further 
transformed when it reaches the cook ; it then becomes a 
Plum, for Plum pudding has, as we all know, Raisins for its 
chief ingredient and certainly no Plums ; and the Christmas 
pie into which Jack Horner put his thumb and pulled out 
a Plum must have been a mince-pie, also made of Raisins ; 
but how a cooked Raisin came to be called a Plum is not 
recorded. In Devonshire and Dorsetshire it undergoes a 
further transformation, for there Raisins are called Figs, and 
a Plum pudding is called a Fig pudding. 
