ways to be seen: we have their humble "pennywort, herb twopence, moneywort, silverweed, and gold." We may smile, perhaps, at the cognomens, or the commemorations of friendships, or of worth, recorded by the old simplers, at their herbs, "Bennet, Robert, Christopher, Gerard, or Basil;" but do the names so bestowed by modern science read better, or sound better? it has "Lightfootia, Lapeyrousia, Hedwigia, Schkuhria, Scheuchzeria;" and surely we may admit, in common benevolence, such partialities as "good King Henry, sweet William, sweet Marjory, sweet Cicely, Lettuce, Mary Gold, and Rose." There are epithets, however, so very extraordinary, that we must consider them as mere perversions, or at least incapable of explanation at this period. The terms of modern science waver daily; names undergo an annual change, fade with the leaf, and give place to others; but the ancient terms, which some may ridicule, have remained for centuries, and will yet remain till nature is swallowed up by art. No: let our ancient herbalists, "a grave and whiskered race," retain the honours due to their labours, which were most needful and important ones at those periods; by them were many of the casualties and sufferings of man and beast relieved; and by aid

of perseverance, better constitutions to act upon, and faith to operate, than we possess, they probably effected cures, which we moderns should fail to accomplish if attempted.

Upon an old bank, tangled with bushes and rubbish, we find in abundance that very early translated, and perfectly domesticated flower, the cottage snowdrop (galanthus nivalis); a plant that is undoubtedly a native of our island, for I have seen it in situations where nature only could introduce it, where it was never planted by the hand of man, or strayed from any neighbouring cultivation. Yet in most places where we find this flower, it is of manifest or suspicious origin, and with us it partakes of this latter character, though no remains of any ancient dwelling are observable near it. The damask rose, the daffodil, or the stock of an old bullace plum, will long remain, and point out where once a cottage existed; but all these, and most other tokens, in time waste away and decay; while the snowdrop will remain, increase, and become the only memorial of man and his labours. Many flowers present strong distinctive characters, or will, at least often do, excite in us variable feelings: the primrose, and the daisy, if not intrinsically gay, call forth cheerful

and pleasing sensations; and the aspect or glance of some others will awaken different affections. The snowdrop is a melancholy flower. The season, in which the "fair maids of February" come out, is the most dreary and desolate of our year; they peep through the snow that often surrounds them, shivering and cheerless; they convey no idea of reviving nature, and are scarcely the harbingers of milder days, but rather the emblem of sleety storms, and icy gales (snowdrop weather), and wrap their petals round the infant germ, fearing to admit the very air that blows: and, when found beyond the verge of cultivation, they most generally remind us of some deserted dwelling, a family gone, a hearth that smokes no more. A lover of cold, it maintains the beautiful ovate form of its flower only in a low temperature; warmth expanding the petals, vitiating its grace, and destroying its character. It seems to preserve its native purity free from every contamination; it will become double, but never wanders into varieties, is never streaked or tinged with the hues of other flowers.

One of our pasture grasses is particularly affected by dry weather. Several are injured frequently by drought acting upon the stalk, not

molesting the root, but withering the succulent base of the straw, which arises from the upper joint; in consequence of which, the panicle, and connecting straw, dry away, while the foliage and lower leaves remain uninjured. None are so obnoxious to this injury as the yellow oatgrass (avena flavescens), and in some seasons almost the whole of its panicles will be withered in a field of surrounding verdure. Pastures that are grazed must from circumstances be drier than those covered with herbage fit for the sithe; yet, from some unknown cause, this oat-grass seems less injured in this respect in grazing grounds, than in those where the herbage is reserved for mowing.

The plain, simple, unadorned vervain (verbena officinalis), is one of our most common, and decidedly waste-loving plants. Disinclined to all cultured places, it fixes its residence by waysides, and old stone quarries, thriving under the feet of every passing creature. The celebrity that this plant obtained in very remote times, without its possessing one apparent quality, or presenting by its manner of growth, or form, any mysterious character to arrest the attention, or excite imagination, is very extraordinary, and perhaps unaccountable: most nations venerated,

esteemed, and used it; the ancients had their Verbenalia, at which period the temples and frequented places were strewed and sanctified with vervain; the beasts for sacrifice, and the altars, were verbenated, the one filleted, the other strewed with the sacred herb; no incantation or lustration was perfect without the aid of this plant. That misteltoe should have excited attention in days of darkness and ignorance is not a subject of surprise, from the extraordinary and obscure manner of its growth and propagation, and the season of the year in which it flourishes; for even the great lord Bacon ridicules the idea of its being propagated by the operations of a bird as an "idle tradition," saying, that the sap which produces this plant is such as the "tree doth excerne and cannot assimilate." These circumstances, and its great dissimilarity from the plant on which it vegetates, all combine to render it a subject of superstitious wonder: but that a lowly ineffective herb like our vervain should have stimulated the imaginations of the priests of Rome, of Gaul, and of Greece, the magi of India, and the Druids of Britain, is passing comprehension; and, as Pennant observes, "so general a consent proves, that the custom arose before the different nations had