The Botanic Garden Volume Ii Part 9

CANTO III.

And now the G.o.ddess founds her silver sh.e.l.l, And shakes with deeper tones the inchanted dell; Pale, round her gra.s.sy throne, bedew'd with tears, Flit the thin forms of Sorrows, and of Fears; 5 Soft Sighs responsive whisper to the chords, And Indignations half-unsheath their swords.

"Thrice round the grave CIRCaeA prints her tread, And chaunts the numbers, which disturb the dead; Shakes o'er the holy earth her sable plume, 10 Waves her dread wand, and strikes the echoing tomb!

--Pale shoot the stars across the troubled night, The timorous moon withholds her conscious light; Shrill scream the famish'd bats, and shivering owls, And loud and long the dog of midnight howls!--

[_Circaea_. l. 7. Enchanter's Nightshade. Two males, one female. It was much celebrated in the mysteries of witchcraft, and for the purpose of raising the devil, as its name imports. It grows amid the mouldering bones and decayed coffins in the ruinous vaults of Sleaford-church in Lincolnshire. The superst.i.tious ceremonies or histories belonging to some vegetables have been truly ridiculous; thus the Druids are said to have cropped the Misletoe with a golden axe or sickle; and the Bryony, or Mandrake, was said to utter a scream when its root was drawn from the ground; and that the animal which drew it up became diseased and soon died: on which account, when it was wanted for the purposes of medicine, it was usual to loosen and remove the earth about the root, and then to tie it by means of a cord to a dog's tail, who was whipped to pull it up, and was then supposed to suffer for the impiety of the action. And even at this day bits of dried root of Peony are rubbed smooth, and strung, and sold under the name of Anodyne necklaces, and tied round the necks of children, to facilitate the growth of their teeth! add to this, that in Price's History of Cornwall, a book published about ten years ago, the Virga Divinatoria, or Divining Rod, has a degree of credit given to it.

This rod is of hazle, or other light wood, and held horizontally in the hand, and is said to bow towards the ore whenever the Conjurer walks over a mine. A very few years ago, in France, and even in England, another kind of divining rod has been used to discover springs of water in a similar manner, and gained some credit. And in the very last year, there were many in France, and some in England, who underwent an enchantment without any divining rod at all, and believed themselves to be affected by an invisible agent, which the Enchanter called Animal Magnetism!]

--Then yawns the bursting ground!--_two_ imps obscene Rise on broad wings, and hail the baleful queen; Each with dire grin salutes the potent wand, And leads the sorceress with his sooty hand; Onward they glide, where sheds the sickly yew 20 O'er many a mouldering bone its nightly dew; The ponderous portals of the church unbar,-- Hoa.r.s.e on their hinge the ponderous portals jar; As through the colour'd gla.s.s the moon-beam falls, Huge shapeless spectres quiver on the walls; 25 Low murmurs creep along the hollow ground, And to each step the pealing ailes resound; By glimmering lamps, protecting saints among, The shrines all tremble as they pa.s.s along, O'er the still choir with hideous laugh they move, 30 (Fiends yell below, and angels weep above!) Their impious march to G.o.d's high altar bend, With feet impure the sacred steps ascend; With wine unbless'd the holy chalice stain, a.s.sume the mitre, and the cope profane; 35 To heaven their eyes in mock devotion throw, And to the cross with horrid mummery bow; Adjure by mimic rites the powers above, And plite alternate their Satanic love.

Avaunt, ye Vulgar! from her sacred groves 40 With maniac step the Pythian LAURA moves; Full of the G.o.d her labouring bosom sighs, Foam on her lips, and fury in her eyes, Strong writhe her limbs, her wild dishevell'd hair Starts from her laurel-wreath, and swims in air.-- 45 While _twenty_ Priests the gorgeous shrine surround Cinctur'd with ephods, and with garlands crown'd,

[_Laura_. l. 40. Prunus. Lauro-cerasus. Twenty males, one female. The Pythian priestess is supposed to have been made drunk with infusion of laurel-leaves when she delivered her oracles. The intoxication or inspiration is finely described by Virgil. aen. L. vi. The distilled water from laurel-leaves is, perhaps, the most sudden poison we are acquainted with in this country. I have seen about two spoonfuls of it destroy a large pointer dog in less than ten minutes. In a smaller dose it is said to produce intoxication: on this account there is reason to believe it acts in the same manner as opium and vinous spirit; but that the dose is not so well ascertained. See note on Tremella. It is used in the Ratafie of the distillers, by which some dram-drinkers have been suddenly killed. One pint of water, distilled from fourteen pounds of black cherry stones bruised, has the same deleterious effect, destroying as suddenly as laurel-water. It is probable Apricot-kernels, Peach-leaves, Walnut-leaves, and whatever possesses the kernel-flavour, may have similar qualities.]

Contending hosts and trembling nations wait The firm immutable behests of Fate; --She speaks in thunder from her golden throne 50 With words _unwill'd_, and wisdom not her own.

So on his NIGHTMARE through the evening fog Flits the squab Fiend o'er fen, and lake, and bog; Seeks some love-wilder'd Maid with sleep oppress'd, Alights, and grinning fits upon her breast.

55 --Such as of late amid the murky sky Was mark'd by FUSELI'S poetic eye; Whose daring tints, with SHAKESPEAR'S happiest grace, Gave to the airy phantom form and place.-- Back o'er her pillow sinks her blushing head, 60 Her snow-white limbs hang helpless from the bed; While with quick sighs, and suffocative breath, Her interrupted heart-pulse swims in death.

--Then shrieks of captured towns, and widows' tears, Pale lovers stretch'd upon their blood-stain'd biers, 65 The headlong precipice that thwarts her flight, The trackless desert, the cold starless night, And stern-eye'd Murder with his knife behind, In dread succession agonize her mind.

O'er her fair limbs convulsive tremors fleet, 70 Start in her hands, and struggle in her feet; In vain to scream with quivering lips she tries, And strains in palsy'd lids her tremulous eyes; In vain she _wills_ to run, fly, swim, walk, creep; The WILL presides not in the bower of SLEEP.

75 --On her fair bosom sits the Demon-Ape Erect, and balances his bloated shape;

[_The Will presides not._ 1. 74. Sleep consists in the abolition of all voluntary power, both over our muscular motions and our ideas; for we neither walk nor reason in sleep. But, at the same time, many of our muscular motions, and many of our ideas, continue to be excited into action in consequence of internal irritations and of internal sensations; for the heart and arteries continue to beat, and we experience variety of pa.s.sions, and even hunger and thirst in our dreams. Hence I conclude, that our nerves of sense are not torpid or inert during sleep; but that they are only precluded from the perception of external objects, by their external organs being rendered unfit to transmit to them the appulses of external bodies, during the suspension of the power of volition; thus the eye-lids are closed in sleep, and I suppose the tympanum of the car is not stretched, because they are deprived of the voluntary exertions of the muscles appropriated to these purposes; and it is probable something similar happens to the external apparatus of our other organs of sense, which may render them unfit for their office of perception during sleep: for milk put into the mouths of sleeping babes occasions them to swallow and suck; and, if the eye-lid is a little opened in the day-light by the exertions of disturbed sleep, the person dreams of being much dazzled.

See first Interlude.]

Rolls in their marble orbs his Gorgon-eyes, And drinks with leathern ears her tender cries.

Arm'd with her ivory beak, and talon-hands, 80 Descending FICA dives into the sands; Chamber'd in earth with cold oblivion lies; Nor heeds, _ye Suitor-train_, your amorous sighs; Erewhile with renovated beauty blooms, Mounts into air, and moves her leafy plumes.

85 --Where HAMPS and MANIFOLD, their cliffs among, Each in his flinty channel winds along; With lucid lines the dusky Moor divides, Hurrying to intermix their sister tides.

[When there arises in sleep a painful desire to exert the voluntary motions, it is called the Nightmare or Incubus. When the sleep becomes so imperfect that some muscular motions obey this exertion of desire, people have walked about, and even performed some domestic offices in sleep; one of these sleep-walkers I have frequently seen: once she smelt of a tube-rose, and sung, and drank a dish of tea in this state; her awaking was always attended with prodigious surprize, and even fear; this disease had daily periods, and seemed to be of the epileptic kind.]

[_Ficus indica_. l. 80. Indian Fig-tree. Of the gla.s.s Polygamy. This large tree rises with opposite branches on all sides, with long egged leaves; each branch emits a slender flexile depending appendage from its summit like a cord, which roots into the earth and rises again. Sloan. Hist. of Jamaica. Lin. Spec. Plant. See Capri-ficus.]

Where still their silver-bosom'd Nymphs abhor, 90 The blood-smear'd mansion of gigantic THOR,-- --Erst, fires volcanic in the marble womb Of cloud-wrapp'd WETTON raised the ma.s.sy dome; Rocks rear'd on rocks in huge disjointed piles Form the tall turrets, and the lengthen'd ailes;

[_Gigantic Thor._ l. 90. Near the village of Wetton, a mile or two above Dove-Dale, near Ashburn in Dirbyshire, there is a s.p.a.cious cavern about the middle of the ascent of the mountain, which still retains the Name of Thor's house; below is an extensive and romantic common, where the rivers Hamps and Manifold sink into the earth, and rise again in Ham gardens, the seat of John Port, Esq. about three miles below. Where these rivers rise again there are impressions resembling Fish, which appear to be of Jasper bedded in Limestone. Calcareous Spars, Sh.e.l.ls converted into a kind of Agate, corallines in Marble, ores of Lead, Copper, and Zinc, and many strata of Flint, or Chert, and of Toadstone, or Lava, abound in this part of the country. The Druids are said to have offered human sacrifices inclosed in wicker idols to Thor. Thursday had its name from this Deity.

The broken appearance of the surface of many parts of this country; with the Swallows, as they are called, or basons on some of the mountains, like volcanic Craters, where the rain-water sinks into the earth; and the numerous large stones, which seem to have been thrown over the land by volcanic explosions; as well as the great ma.s.ses of Toadstone or Lava; evince the existence of violent earthquakes at some early period of the world. At this time the channels of these subterraneous rivers seem to have been formed, when a long tract of rocks were raised by the sea flowing in upon the central fires, and thus producing an irresistable explosion of steam; and when these rocks again subsided, their parts did not exactly correspond, but left a long cavity arched over in this operation of nature. The cavities at Castleton and Buxton in Derbyshire seem to have had a similar origin, as well as this cavern termed Thor's house. See Mr. Whitehurst's and Dr. Hutton's Theories of the Earth.]

95 Broad ponderous piers sustain the roof, and wide Branch the vast rain-bow ribs from side to side.

While from above descends in milky streams One scanty pencil of illusive beams, Suspended crags and gaping gulphs illumes, 100 And gilds the horrors of the deepen'd glooms.

--Here oft the Naiads, as they chanced to play Near the dread Fane on THOR'S returning day, Saw from red altars streams of guiltless blood Stain their green reed-beds, and pollute their flood; 105 Heard dying babes in wicker prisons wail, And shrieks of matrons thrill the affrighted Gale; While from dark caves infernal Echoes mock, And Fiends triumphant shout from every rock!

---So still the Nymphs emerging lift in air 110 Their snow-white shoulders and their azure hair; Sail with sweet grace the dimpling streams along, Listening the Shepherd's or the Miner's song; But, when afar they view the giant-cave, On timorous fins they circle on the wave, 115 With streaming eyes and throbbing hearts recoil, Plunge their fair forms, and dive beneath the soil.-- Closed round their heads reluctant eddies sink, And wider rings successive dash the brink.-- Three thousand steps in sparry clefts they stray, 120 Or seek through sullen mines their gloomy way; On beds of Lava sleep in coral cells, Or sigh o'er jasper fish, and agate sh.e.l.ls.

Till, where famed ILAM leads his boiling floods Through flowery meadows and impending woods, 125 Pleased with light spring they leave the dreary night, And 'mid circ.u.mfluent surges rise to light; Shake their bright locks, the widening vale pursue, Their sea-green mantles fringed with pearly dew; In playful groups by towering THORP they move, 130 Bound o'er the foaming wears, and rush into the Dove.

With fierce distracted eye IMPATIENS stands, Swells her pale cheeks, and brandishes her hands,

[_Impatiens._ l. 131. Touch me not. The seed vessel consists of one cell with five divisions; each of these, when the seed is ripe, on being touched, suddenly folds itself into a spiral form, leaps from the stalk and disperses the seeds to a great distance by it's elasticity. The capsule of the geranium and the beard of wild oats are twisted for a similar purpose, and dislodge their seeds on wet days, when the ground is best fitted to receive them. Hence one of these, with its adhering capsule or beard fixed on a stand, serves the purpose of an hygrometer, twisting itself more or less according to the moisture of the air.

The awn of barley is furnished with stiff points, which, like the teeth of a saw, are all turned towards the point of it; as this long awn lies upon the ground, it extends itself in the moist air of night, and pushes forwards the barley corn, which it adheres to; in the day it shortens as it dries; and as these points prevent it from receding, it draws up its pointed end; and thus, creeping like a worm, will travel many feet from the parent stem. That very ingenious Mechanic Philosopher, Mr. Edgeworth, once made on this principle a wooden automaton; its back consisted of soft Fir-wood, about an inch square, and four feet long, made of pieces cut the cross-way in respect to the fibres of the wood, and glued together: it had two feet before, and two behind, which supported the back horizontally; but were placed with their extremities, which were armed with sharp points of iron, bending backwards. Hence, in moist weather, the back lengthened, and the two foremost feet were pushed forwards; in dry weather the hinder feet were drawn after, as the obliquity of the points of the feet prevented it from receding. And thus, in a month or two, it walked across the room which it inhabited. Might not this machine be applied as an Hygrometer to some meteorological purpose?]

With rage and hate the astonish'd groves alarms, And hurls her infants from her frantic arms.

135 --So when MEDaeA left her native soil Unaw'd by danger, unsubdued by toil; Her weeping sire and beckoning friends withstood, And launch'd enamour'd on the boiling flood; One ruddy boy her gentle lips caress'd, 140 And one fair girl was pillow'd on her breast;

While high in air the golden treasure burns, And Love and Glory guide the prow by turns.

But, when Thessalia's inauspicious plain Received the matron-heroine from the main; 145 While horns of triumph sound, and altars burn, And shouting nations hail their Chief's return: Aghaft, She saw new-deck'd the nuptial bed, And proud CREUSA to the temple led; Saw her in JASON'S mercenary arms 150 Deride her virtues, and insult her charms; Saw her dear babes from fame and empire torn, In foreign realms deserted and forlorn; Her love rejected, and her vengeance braved, By Him her beauties won, her virtues saved.-- 155 With stern regard she eyed the traitor-king, And felt, Ingrat.i.tude! thy keenest sting; "Nor Heaven," She cried, "nor Earth, nor h.e.l.l can hold "A Heart abandon'd to the thirst of Gold!"

Stamp'd with wild foot, and shook her horrent brow, 160 And call'd the furies from their dens below.

--Slow out of earth, before the festive crowds, On wheels of fire, amid a night of clouds, Drawn by fierce fiends arose a magic car, Received the Queen, and hovering flamed in air.-- 165 As with raised hands the suppliant traitors kneel And fear the vengeance they deserve to feel, Thrice with parch'd lips her guiltless babes she press'd, And thrice she clasp'd them to her tortur'd breast; Awhile with white uplifted eyes she stood, 170 Then plung'd her trembling poniards in their blood.

"Go, kiss your sire! go, share the bridal mirth!"

She cry'd, and hurl'd their quivering limbs on earth.

Rebellowing thunders rock the marble towers, And red-tongued lightnings shoot their arrowy showers; 175 Earth yawns!--the crashing ruin sinks!--o'er all Death with black hands extends his mighty Pall; Their mingling gore the Fiends of Vengeance quaff, And h.e.l.l receives them with convulsive laugh.

Round the vex'd isles where fierce tornados roar, 180 Or tropic breezes sooth the sultry sh.o.r.e; What time the eve her gauze pellucid spreads O'er the dim flowers, and veils the misty meads; Slow, o'er the twilight sands or leafy walks, With gloomy dignity DICTAMNA stalks;

[_Dictamnus._ l. 184. Fraxinella. In the still evenings of dry seasons this plant emits an inflammable air or gas, and flashes on the approach of a candle. There are instances of human creatures who have taken fire spontaneously, and been totally consumed. Phil. Trans.

The odours of many flowers, so delightful to our sense of smell, as well as the disgreeable scents of others, are owing to the exhalation of their essential oils. These essential oils have greater or less volatility, and are all inflammable; many of them are poisons to us, as these of Laurel and Tobacco; others possess a narcotic quality, as is evinced by the oil of cloves instantly relieving slight tooth-achs; from oil of cinnamon relieving the hiccup; and balsam of peru relieving the pain of some ulcers. They are all deleterious to certain insects, and hence their use in the vegetable economy being produced in flowers or leaves to protect them from the depredations of their voracious enemies. One of the essential oils, that of turpentine, is recommended, by M. de Thosse, for the purpose of destroying insects which infect both vegetables and animals. Having observed that the trees were attacked by mult.i.tudes of small insects of different colours (pucins ou pucerons), which injured their young branches, he destroyed them all intirely in the following manner: he put into a bowl a few handfuls of earth, on which he poured a small quant.i.ty of oil of turpentine; he then beat the whole together with a spatula, pouring on it water till it became of the consistence of soup; with this mixture he moistened the ends of the branches, and both the insects and their eggs were destroyed, and other insects kept aloof by the scent of the turpentine. He adds, that he destroyed the fleas of his puppies by once bathing them in warm water impregnated with oil of turpentine. Mem. d'Agriculture, An. 1787, Trimest. Printemp. p. 109. I sprinkled some oil of turpentine, by means of a brush, on some branches of a nectarine-tree, which was covered with the aphis; but it killed both the insect and the branches: a solution of a.r.s.enic much diluted did the same. The shops of medicine are supplied with resins, balsams, and essential oils; and the tar and pitch, for mechanical purposes, arc produced from these vegetable secretions.]

185 In sulphurous eddies round the weird dame Plays the light gas, or kindles into flame.

If rests the traveller his weary head, Grim MANCINELLA haunts the mossy bed, Brews her black hebenon, and, stealing near, 190 Pours the curst venom in his tortured ear.-- Wide o'er the mad'ning throng URTICA flings Her barbed shafts, and darts her poison'd stings.

[_Mancinella_, I. 188. Hyppomane. With the milky juice of this tree the Indians poison their arrows; the dew-drops, which fall from it, are so caustic as to blister the skin, and produce dangerous ulcers; whence many have found their death by sleeping under its shade. Variety of noxious plants abound in all countries; in our own the deadly nightshade, henbane, hounds-tongue, and many others, are seen in almost every high road untouched by animals. Some have asked, what is the use of such abundance of poisons? The nauseous or pungent juices of some vegetables, like the thorns of others, are given them for their defence from the depredations of animals; hence the th.o.r.n.y plants are in general wholesome and agreeable food to graminivorous animals. See note on Ilex. The flowers or petals of plants are perhaps in general more acrid than their leaves; hence they are much seldomer eaten by insects. This seems to have been the use of the essential oil in the vegetable economy, as observed above in the notes on Dictamnus and on Ilex. The fragrance of plants is thus a part of their defence. These pungent or nauseous juices of vegetables have supplied the science of medicine with its princ.i.p.al materials, such as purge, vomit, intoxicate, &c.]

[_Urtica_. I. 191. Nettle. The sting has a bag at its base, and a perforation near its point, exactly like the stings of wasps and the teeth of adders; Hook, Microgr. p. 142. Is the fluid contained in this bag, and pressed through the perforation into the wound, made by the point, a caustic essential oil, or a concentrated vegetable acid?

The vegetable poisons, like the animal ones, produce more sudden and dangerous effects, when instilled into a wound, than when taken into the stomach; whence the families of Marfi and Psilli, in antient Rome, sucked the poison without injury out of wounds made by vipers, and were supposed to be indued with supernatural powers for this purpose. By the experiments related by Beccaria, it appears that four or five times the quant.i.ty, taken by the mouth, had about equal effects with that infused into a wound. The male flowers of the nettle are separate from the female, and the anthers are seen in fair weather to burst with force, and to discharge a dust, which hovers about the plant like a cloud.]

And fell LOBELIA'S suffocating breath Loads the dank pinion of the gale with death.-- 195 With fear and hate they blast the affrighted groves, Yet own with tender care their _kindred Loves!_-- So, where PALMIRA 'mid her wasted plains, Her shatter'd aqueducts, and prostrate sanes,

[_Lobelia. I._ 193. Longiflora. Grows in the West Indies, and spreads such deleterious exhalations around it, that an oppression of the breast is felt on approaching it at many feet distance when placed in the corner of a room or hot-house. Ingenhouz, Exper. on Air, p. 14.6. Jacquini hort.