The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare Part 83

(4) _Ariel._

With hair up-staring--then like Reeds, not hair--

_Ibid._, act i, sc. 2 (213).

(5) _Hotspur._

Swift Severn's flood; Who then, affrighted with their b.l.o.o.d.y looks, Ran fearfully among the trembling Reeds.

_1st Henry IV_, act 1, sc. 3 (103).

(6) _Portia._

And speak between the change of man and boy With a Reed voice.

_Merchant of Venice_, act iii, sc. 4 (66).

(7) _Wooer._

In the great Lake that lies behind the Pallace From the far sh.o.r.e thick set with Reeds and Sedges.

The Rushes and the Reeds Had so encompast it.

_Two n.o.ble Kinsmen_, act iv, sc. 1 (71, 80).

(8)

To Simois' Reedy banks the red blood ran.

_Lucrece_ (1437).

Reed is a general term for almost any water-loving, gra.s.sy plant, and so it is used by Shakespeare. In the Bible it is perhaps possible to identify some of the Reeds mentioned, with the Sugar Cane in some places, with the Papyrus in others, and in others with the Arundo donax.

As a Biblical plant it has a special interest, not only as giving the emblem of the tenderest mercy that will be careful even of "the bruised Reed," but also as entering largely into the mockery of the Crucifixion: "They put a Reed in His right hand," and "they filled a sponge full of vinegar, and put it upon a Reed and gave Him to drink." The Reed in these pa.s.sages was probably the Arundo donax, a very elegant Reed, which was used for many purposes in Palestine, and is a most graceful plant for English gardens, being perfectly hardy, and growing every year from 12ft. to 14ft. in height, but very seldom flowering.[240:1]

But in Shakespeare, as in most writers, the Reed is simply the emblem of weakness, tossed about by and bending to a superior force, and of little or no use--"a Reed that will do me no service" (No. 1). It is also the emblem of the blessedness of submission, and of the power that lies in humility to outlast its oppressor--

"Like as in tempest great, Where wind doth bear the stroke, Much safer stands the bowing Reed Then doth the stubborn Oak."

Shakespeare mentions but two uses to which the Reed was applied, the thatching of houses (No. 3), and the making of Pan or Shepherd's pipes (No. 6). Nor has he anything to say of its beauty, yet the Reeds of our river sides (_Arundo phragmites_) are most graceful plants, especially when they have their dark plumes of flowers, and this Milton seems to have felt--

"Forth flourish't thick the fl.u.s.tering Vine, forth crept The swelling Gourd, up stood the Cornie Reed Embattled in her field."

_Paradise Lost_, book vii.

FOOTNOTES:

[240:1] I have only been able to find one record of the flowering of Arundo donax in England--"Mem: Arundo donax in flower, 15th September, 1762, the first time I ever saw it, but this very hot dry summer has made many exotics flower. . . . It bears a handsome ta.s.sel of flowers."--P. COLLINSON'S _Hortus Collinsonia.n.u.s_.

RHUBARB.

_Macbeth._

What Rhubarb, Cyme, or what purgative drug Would scour these English hence?

_Macbeth_, act v, sc. 3 (55).

Andrew Boorde writing from Spayne in 1535, to Thomas Cromwell, says, "I have sent to your Mastershipp the seeds of Reuberbe the whiche come forth of Barbary in this parte ytt ys had for a grett tresure."[241:1]

But the plant does not seem to have become established and Shakespeare could only have known the imported drug, for the Rheum was first grown by Parkinson, though it had been described in an uncertain way both by Lyte and Gerard. Lyte said: "Rha, as it is thought, hath great broad leaves;" and then he says: "We have found here in the gardens of certaine diligent herboristes that strange plant which is thought by some to be Rha or Rhabarb.u.m;" but from the figure it is very certain that the plant was not a Rheum. After the time of Parkinson, it was largely grown for the sake of producing the drug, and it is still grown in England to some extent for the same purpose, chiefly in the neighbourhood of Banbury; though it is doubtful whether any of the species now grown in England are the true species that has long produced Turkey Rhubarb. The plant is now grown most extensively as a spring vegetable, though I cannot find when it first began to be so used.

Parkinson evidently tried it and thought well of it. "The leaves have a fine acid taste; a syrup, therefore, made with the juice and sugar cannot but be very effectual in dejected appet.i.tes." Yet even in 1807 Professor Martyn, the editor of "Millar's Dictionary," in a long article on the Rhubarb, makes no mention of its culinary qualities, but in 1822 Phillips speaks of it as largely cultivated for spring tarts, and forced for the London markets, "medical men recommending it as one of the most cooling and wholesome tarts sent to table."

As a garden plant the Rhubarb is highly ornamental, though it is seldom seen out of the kitchen garden, but where room can be given to them, Rheum palmatum or Rheum officinale, will always be admired as some of the handsomest of foliage plants. The finest species of the family is the Himalayan Rheum n.o.bile, but it is exceedingly difficult to grow.

Botanically the Rhubarb is allied to the Dock and Sorrel, and all the species are herbaceous.

FOOTNOTES:

[241:1] Quoted in Furnival's forewords to Boorde's "Introduction to Knowledge," p. 56.

RICE.

_Clown._

Let me see; what am I to buy for our sheep-shearing feast?

Three pound of sugar, five pound of Currants, Rice----What will this sister of mine do with Rice?[242:1]

_Winter's Tale_, act iv, sc. 3 (38).

Shakespeare may have had no more acquaintance with Rice than his knowledge of the imported grain, which seems to have been long ago introduced into England, for in a Nominale of the fifteenth century we have "Hoc risi, indeclinabile, Ryse." And in the "Promptorium Parvulorum," "Ryce, frute. Risia, vel risi, n. indecl. secundum quosdam, vel risium, vel risorum granum (rizi vel granum Indic.u.m)." Turner was acquainted with it: "Ryse groweth plentuously in watery myddowes between Myllane and Pavia."[242:2] And Shakespeare may have seen the plant, for Gerard grew it in his London garden, though "the floure did not show itselfe by reason of the injurie of our unseasonable yeare 1596." It is a native of Africa, and was soon transferred to Europe as a nourishing and wholesome grain, especially for invalids--"sume hoc ptisanarium oryzae," says the doctor to his patient in Horace, and it is mentioned both by Dioscorides and Theophrastus. It has been occasionally grown in England as a curiosity, but seldom comes to any perfection out-of-doors, as it requires a mixture of moisture and heat that we cannot easily give it. There are said to be species in the North of China growing in dry places, which would perhaps be hardy in England and easier of cultivation, but I am not aware that they have ever been introduced.

FOOTNOTES:

[242:1] In 1468 the price of rice was 3d. a pound = 3s. of our money ("Babee's Book," x.x.x.).