The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare Part 11

(3) _Thersites._

That same dog-fox Ulysses is not proved worth a Blackberry.

_Troilus and Cressida_, act v, sc. 4 (12).

(4) _Rosalind._

There is a man . . . . hangs odes upon Hawthorns and elegies on Brambles.

_As You Like it_, act iii, sc. 2 (379).

(5)

The th.o.r.n.y Brambles and embracing bushes, As fearful of him, part, through whom he rushes.

_Venus and Adonis_ (629).

I here join together the tree and the fruit, the Bramble (_Rubus fruticosus_) and the Blackberry. There is not much to be said for a plant that is the proverbial type of a barren country or untidy cultivation, yet the Bramble and the Blackberry have their charms, and we could ill afford to lose them from our hedgerows. The name Bramble originally meant anything th.o.r.n.y, and Chaucer applied it to the Dog Rose--

"He was chaste and no lechour, And sweet as is the Bramble flower That bereth the red hepe."

But in Shakespeare's time it was evidently confined to the Blackberry-bearing Bramble.

There is a quaint legend of the origin of the plant which is worth repeating. It is thus pleasantly told by Waterton: "The cormorant was once a wool merchant. He entered into partnership with the Bramble and the bat, and they freighted a large ship with wool; she was wrecked, and the firm became bankrupt. Since that disaster the bat skulks about till midnight to avoid his creditors, the cormorant is for ever diving into the deep to discover its foundered vessel, while the Bramble seizes hold of every pa.s.sing sheep to make up his loss by stealing the wool."

As a garden plant, the common Bramble had better be kept out of the garden, but there are double pink and white-blossomed varieties, and others with variegated leaves, that are handsome plants on rough rockwork. The little Rubus saxatilis is a small British Bramble that is pretty on rockwork, and among the foreign Brambles there are some that should on no account be omitted where ornamental shrubs are grown. Such are the R. leucodermis from Nepaul, with its bright silvery bark and amber-coloured fruit; R. Nootka.n.u.s, with very handsome foliage, and pure white rose-like flowers; R. Arcticus, an excellent rockwork plant from Northern Europe, with very pleasant fruit, but difficult to establish; R. Australis (from New Zealand), a most quaint plant, with leaves so depauperated that it is apparently leafless, and hardy in the South of England; and R. deliciosus, a very handsome plant from the Rocky Mountains. There are several others well worth growing, but I mention these few to show that the Bramble is not altogether such a villainous and useless weed as it is proverbially supposed to be.

FOOTNOTES:

[37:1] _See_ RAISINS, p. 238.

BOX.

_Maria._ Get ye all three into the Box tree.

_Twelfth Night_, act ii, sc. 5 (18).

The Box is a native British tree, and in the sixteenth century was probably much more abundant as a wild tree than it is now. Chaucer notes it as a dismal tree. He describes Palamon in his misery as--

"Like was he to byholde, The Boxe tree or the a.s.schen deed and colde."

_The Knightes Tale._

Spenser noted it as "The Box yet mindful of his olde offence," and in Shakespeare's time there were probably more woods of Box in England than the two which still remain at Box Hill, in Surrey, and Boxwell, in Gloucestershire. The name remains, though the trees are gone, in Box in Wilts, Boxgrove, Boxley, Boxmoor, Boxted, and Boxworth.[39:1] From its wild quarters the Box tree was very early brought into gardens, and was especially valued, not only for its rich evergreen colour, but because, with the Yew, it could be cut and tortured into all the ungainly shapes which so delighted our ancestors in Shakespeare's time, though one of the most ill.u.s.trious of them, Lord Bacon, entered his protest against such barbarisms: "I, for my part, do not like images cut out in Juniper or other garden stuff; they be for children" ("Essay of Gardens").

The chief use of the Box now is for blocks for wood-carving, for which its close grain makes it the most suitable of all woods.[39:2]

FOOTNOTES:

[39:1] In Boxford, and perhaps in some of the other names, the word has no connection with the tree, but marks the presence of water or a stream.

[39:2] In some parts of Europe almost a sacred character is given to the Box. For a curious record of blessing the Box, and of a sermon on the lessons taught by the Box, see "Gardener's Chronicle," April 19, 1873.

BRAMBLE, _see_ BLACKBERRIES.

BRIER.

(1) _Ariel._

So I charm'd their ears, That calf-like they my lowing follow'd through Tooth'd Briers, sharp Furzes, p.r.i.c.king Goss, and Thorns.

_Tempest_, act iv, sc. 1 (178).

(2) _Fairy._

Over hill, over dale, Thorough Bush, thorough Brier.

_Midsummer Night's Dream_, act ii, sc. 1 (2).

(3) _Thisbe._

Of colour like the red Rose on triumphant Brier.

_Ibid._, act iii, sc. 1 (90).

(4) _Puck._

I'll lead you about a round, Through bog, through bush, through Brake, through Brier.

_Midsummer Night's Dream_, act iii, sc. 1 (10).