The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare Part 39

(20) _Ophelia._

He is dead and gone, lady, He is dead and gone; At his head a Gra.s.s-green turf, At his heels a stone.

_Ibid._, act iv, sc. 5 (29).

(21) _Salarino._

I should be still Plucking the Gra.s.s to know where sits the wind.

_Merchant of Venice_, act i, sc. 1 (17).

In and before Shakespeare's time Gra.s.s was used as a general term for all plants. Thus Chaucer--

"And every gra.s.s that groweth upon roote Sche schal eek know, to whom it will do boote Al be his woundes never so deep and wyde."

_The Squyeres Tale._

It is used in the same general way in the Bible, "the Gra.s.s of the field."

In the whole range of botanical studies the accurate study of the Gra.s.ses is, perhaps, the most difficult as the genus is the most extensive, for Gra.s.ses are said to "const.i.tute, perhaps, a twelfth part of the described species of flowering plants, and at least nine-tenths of the number of individuals comprising the vegetation of the world"

(Lindley), so that a full study of the Gra.s.ses may almost be said to be the work of a lifetime. But Shakespeare was certainly no such student of Gra.s.ses: in all these pa.s.sages Gra.s.s is only mentioned in a generic manner, without any reference to any particular Gra.s.s. The pa.s.sages in which hay is mentioned, I have not thought necessary to quote.

HAREBELL.

_Arviragus._

Thou shalt not lack The flower that's like thy face, pale Primrose, nor The azured Harebell, like thy veins.

_Cymbeline_, act iv, sc. 2 (220).

(_See_ EGLANTINE.)

The Harebell of Shakespeare is undoubtedly the Wild Hyacinth (_Scilla nutans_), the "sanguine flower inscribed with woe" of Milton's "Lycidas," though we must bear in mind that the name is applied differently in various parts of the island; thus "the Harebell of Scotch writers is the Campanula, and the Bluebell, so celebrated in Scottish song, is the Wild Hyacinth or Scilla; while in England the same names are used conversely, the Campanula being the Bluebell and the Wild Hyacinth the Harebell" ("Poets' Pleasaunce")--but this will only apply in poetry; in ordinary language, at least in the South of England, the Wild Hyacinth is the Bluebell, and is the plant referred to by Shakespeare as the Harebell.

It is one of the chief ornaments of our woods,[109:1] growing in profusion wherever it establishes itself, and being found of various colours--pink, white, and blue. As a garden flower it may well be introduced into shrubberies, but as a border plant it cannot compete with its rival relation, the Hyacinthus orientalis, which is the parent of all the fine double and many coloured Hyacinths in which the florists have delighted for the last two centuries.

FOOTNOTES:

[109:1] "'Dust of sapphire,' writes my friend Dr. John Brown to me of the wood Hyacinths of Scotland in the spring; yes, that is so--each bud more beautiful itself than perfectest jewel."--RUSKIN, _Proserpina_, p.

73.

HARLOCKS.

_Cordelia._

Crown'd with rank Fumiter and Furrow-weeds, With Harlocks, Hemlock, Nettles, Cuckoo-flowers.

_King Lear_, act iv, sc. 4 (3).

(_See_ CUCKOO-FLOWERS.)

I cannot do better than follow Dr. Prior on this word: "Harlock, as usually printed in 'King Lear' and in Drayton, ecl. 4--

'The Honeysuckle, the Harlocke, The Lily and the Lady-smocke,'

is a word that does not occur in the Herbals, and which the commentators have supposed to be a misprint for Charlock. There can be little doubt that Hardock is the correct reading, and that the plant meant is the one now called Burdock." Schmidt also adopts Burdock as the right interpretation.

HAWTHORNS.

(1) _Rosalind._

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

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

(2) _Quince._

This green plot shall be our stage, this Hawthorn-brake our tiring house.

_Midsummer Night's Dream_, act iii, sc. 1 (3).

(3) _Helena._

Your tongue's sweet air, More tuneable than lark to shepherd's ear, When Wheat is green, when Hawthorn-buds appear.

_Ibid._, act i, sc. 1 (183).

(4) _Falstaff._

I cannot cog and say thou art this and that, like a many of these lisping Hawthorn-buds.

_Merry Wives_, act iii, sc. 3 (76).