The Book of Herbs, Rosalind Northcote [best books to read for self development TXT] 📗
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[7] “Miscellanies.”
Sweet Basil (Ocymum basilium) and Bush Basil (O. minimum).Sweet basil and mignonette?
Embleming love and health which never yet
In the same wreath might be.
To Emilia Viviani.—Shelley.
Basil is beloved of the poets, and the story of Isabella and the Basil-pot keeps the plant in memory, where it is itself never, or very rarely, seen. The opening lines of Drayton’s pretty poem beginning with Claia’s speech:—
Out of my lap first take I—
are well known, and it is a pity that the whole of it is not oftener quoted. Two maidens make rival chaplets, and then examine the store of simples just gathered by a hermit. Claia chooses her flowers for beauty, Lelipa hers for scent, and Clarinax, the hermit, plucks his for their “virtue” in medicine. Lelipa says:—
Than which, though yours be braver,
Yet this of mine, I’ll undertake,
Shall not be short in favour.
With Basil then I will begin,
Whose scent is wondrous pleasing.
and a goodly number of sweet-herbs follows.
Parkinson[8] says of it, “The ordinary Basill is in a manner wholly spent to make sweete, or washing waters, among other sweet herbes, yet sometimes it is put into nosegays. The Physicall properties are to procure a cheerfull and merry hearte, whereunto the seede is chiefly used in powder.” With such “physicall properties” Basil is too much neglected nowadays. He also refers to the extraordinary but very general idea that it bred scorpions. “Let me, before I leave, relate unto you a pleasant passage between Francisius Marchio, as Advocate of the State of Genoa sent in embassage to the Duke of Milan, and the said Duke, who, refusing to heare his message or to agree unto the conditions proposed, brought an handfull of Basill and offered it to him, who, demanding of him what he meant thereby, answered him, that the properties of that hearbe was, that being gently handled, it gave a pleasant smell, but being hardly wrung and bruised, would breed scorpions, with which witty answer the Duke was so pleased that he confirmed the conditions, and sent him honourably home. It is also observed that scorpions doe much rest and abide under these pots and vessells wherein Basill is planted.” Culpepper,[9] too, had suspicions about it. “This is the herb which all authors are together by the ears about and rail at one another (like lawyers). Galen and Dioscorides hold it not fitting to be taken inwardly, and Chrysippus rails at it with downright Billingsgate rhetoric; Pliny and the Arabians defend it. Something is the matter, this herb and rue will not grow together, no, nor near one another, and we know rue is as great an enemy to poison as any that grows.” Tusser[10] puts both Basils in his list of “strewing herbs,” and also says:—
To grow as the gilliflower, trim in a pot;
That ladies and gentles, to whom ye do serve,
May help her, as needeth, poor life to preserve.
May’s Husbandry.
To which (in Mavor’s edition, 1812) is appended this prim note, “Garden basil, if stroked, leaves a grateful smell on the hand, and the author insinuates that it receives fresh life from being touched by a fair lady.” Both basils are annuals, though Bush Basil may occasionally live through the winter. They are small plants with oval leaves and white, labiate flowers. A modern gardener writes that sweet basil has the flavour of cloves, that it is always demanded by French cooks, and that it is much used to flavour soups, and occasionally salads. M. de la Quintinye,[11] director of the gardens to Louis XIV., shows that over two hundred years ago French cooks were of the same mind about basil as they are to-day; besides mentioning it for the uses just named, he adds, “It is likewise used in ragouts, especially dry ones, for which reason we take care to keep some for winter.” An Italian name for it is Bacia-Nicola.
[8] “Earthly Paradise,” 1629.
[9] English Physitian, popularly known as Culpepper’s Herbal, 1652.
[10] “Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry.”
[11] The Complete Gardener. Trans. by T. Evelyn, 1693.
Borage (Borago officinalis).Comfort and courage to drink to your fill.
N. Hopper.
This reference to Borage touches a long-lived belief—
Give courage—
briefly states one reason of its popularity, which has lasted ever since Pliny praised the plant; besides this, it was supposed to exhilarate the spirits and drive away melancholy. De Gubernatis[12] only found one charge against it, amid universal praise, and this is in a Tuscan ninnerella, a cradle song, where it is accused of frightening a baby! But this evidence is absolutely unsupported by any tradition, and he considers it worthless. Borage was sometimes called Bugloss by the old writers.[13] In 1810 Dr Thornton calls it “one of the four grand cardiac plants,” but shows a lamentable lack of faith himself. Dr Fernie[14] finds that Borage has a “cucumber-like odour,” and that its reputed powers of “refreshing” and “invigorating” are not all due to the imagination; “The fresh juice,” he says, “affords thirty per cent. of nitrate of potash. Thornton had already commented on the nitre it contains, and to prove this he advises that the dried plant be thrown on the fire, when it emits a sort of coruscation, with a slight detonation.” Personal experience teaches that this is easier to observe if the plant is set on fire and burned by itself. Borage might be grown for the sake of its lovely blue flowers alone, and Parkinson gives it a place in his “Earthly Paradise,” because, though it is “wholly in a manner spent for Physicall properties or for the Pot, yet the flowers have alwaies been interposed among the flowers of women’s needle-work”—a practice which would add to the beauty of modern embroidery. He adds that the flowers “of gentlewomen are candid for comfits,” showing that they did not allow sentiment to soar uncontrolled! Bees love borage, and it yields excellent honey, yet another reason for growing it. In the early part of the nineteenth century the young tops were still sometimes boiled for a pot-herb, but in the present day, if used at all, it is put into claret-cup. Till quite lately it was an ingredient in “cool tankards” of wine or cider.
[12] La Mythologie des Plantes.
[13] Family Herbal, 1810.
[14] Herbal Simples, 1895.
Bugloss (Anchusa officinalis).Deck up their windows, and make neat their bowers;
Using such cunning as they did dispose
The ruddy piny (peony) with the lighter rose,
The monkshood with the bugloss, and entwine
The white, the blue, the flesh-like columbine
With pinks, sweet williams.
Britannia’s Pastorals, Book II.—W. Browne.
Deep blue upon the outer towers.
Winchester Castle.—N. Hopper.
Gerarde put Bugloss in one chapter, and Alkanet or Wild Bugloss in another, but nowadays Bugloss or Alkanet are names for the same plant, Anchusa officinalis. The drawings of his Bugloss resemble our Alkanet much more closely than they do any other plant called Bugloss, such as Lycopsis arvensis, small Bugloss, or Echium vulgare, Viper’s Bugloss. The old herbalists, however, were most confusing on the subject. They apply the name Bugloss alternately to Borago officinalis and to different varieties of Anchusa, and then speak of Buglossum as if it were a different species! Evelyn describes it as being “in nature much like Borage but something more astringent,” and recommends the flowers of both as a conserve, for they are “greatly restorative.” As Hogg says that Anchusa officinalis had formerly “a great reputation as a cordial,” Evelyn’s description applies to this plant; we may take it that this is the Bugloss he was thinking of. It is a good plant for a “wild garden,” but has a great tendency to spread. I have found it growing wild in Cornwall. Gerarde tells us that the roots of Anchusa Tinctoria were used to colour waters, syrups, and jellies, and then follows a line of scandal—“The gentlewomen of France doe paint their faces with these roots, as it is said.” Rouge is still made from Alkanet.
Burnet (Poterium Sanguisorba).The freckled Cowslip, Burnet and green Clover.
Henry V., V. ii. 48.
Burnet has “two little leives like unto the winges of birdes, standing out as the bird setteth her winges out when she intendeth to flye.... Ye Duchmen call it Hergottes berdlen, that is God’s little berde, because of the colour that it hath in the toppe.” This is Turner’s[15] information. He has a pleasant style, and tells us out-of-the-way facts or customs in a charming manner. Burnet is the first of the three plants that Sir Francis Bacon desired to be set in alleys, “to perfume the air most delightfully, being trodden upon and crushed.” The others were wild thyme and water-mint. It was a Salad-herb, and has (like Borage) a flavour of cucumber, but it has, most undeservedly, gone out of fashion. The taste is “somewhat warm, and the leaves should be cut young, or else they are apt to be tough. Culpepper and Parkinson advise that a few leaves should be added to a cup of claret wine because” it is “a helpe to make the heart merrie.” Canon Ellacombe[16] says it was “and still is valued as a forage plant that will grow and keep fresh all the winter in dry, barren pastures, thus giving food for sheep when other food was scarce. It has occasionally been cultivated, but the result has not been very satisfactory, except on very poor land, though, according to the Woburn experiments, as reported by Sinclair, it contains a larger amount of nutritive matter in the spring than most of the grasses. It has brown flowers from which it is supposed to derive its name (Brunetto).”
[15] Turner’s Herbal is beautifully illustrated; five initial letters from it are here reproduced.
[16] “Plant-lore and Garden-Craft of Shakespeare.”
INITIAL LETTERS FROM TURNER’S “HERBAL”
Caraway (Carum carvi).Shallow. Now, you shall see my orchard, where, in an
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