INTRODUCTION
What is a Herb? I have heard many definitions, but never one that satisfied the questioner, and shall, therefore, take warning by the failures of others and make no attempt to define the word here. It is, however, fairly safe to say generally that a herb is a plant, green, and aromatic and fit to eat, but it is impossible to deny that there are several undoubted herbs that are not aromatic, a few more grey than green, and one or two unpalatable, if not unwholesome. So no more space shall be devoted to discussing their “nature,” but I will endeavour to present individual ones to the reader as clearly as possible, in order that from their collective properties he may form his own idea of a herb. The objection may be raised that several plants included in this book are outside the subject. To answer this, I would point out that the boundaries of a herb-garden are indefinite, and that the old writers’ views of them were liberal. Besides this, every garden must have an outside hedge or wall, and if this imaginary herb-garden has a row of elder bushes on the East, barberry trees on the West, some bay trees on the South, and a stray willow or so on the North, who can say that they are inappropriately placed? The bay and barberry hold an undisputable position, and the other trees have each an interesting history in folk-lore, magic and medicine. Herbs have been used in all countries and from the earliest times, but I have confined myself, as a rule, to those spoken of by British authors, and used in the British Isles, though not scrupling to quote foreign beliefs or customs where they give weight or completeness to our own or our forefathers’ practices, or are themselves of much interest. We have forgotten much that would be profitable to us.
Mr Dillon, writing in the Nineteenth Century, April, 1894, on “A Neglected Sense”—the sense of smell—describes a Japanese game, the object of which was that while one of the players burned certain kinds of incense or fragrant woods, singly or in combination, the others ventured opinions from the odours arising, and recorded their conjectures by means of specially marked counters on a board. The delicate equipment for it included a silver, open-worked brazier; a spatula, on which the incense was taken up, also of silver, sometimes delicately inlaid with enamel; and silver-framed mica plates (about one inch square), on which the incense had been heated, were set to cool on “a number of medallions, mother-of-pearl, each in the shape of a chrysanthemum flower or of a maple leaf.”
Both Mr Dillon and Miss Lambert (Nineteenth Century, May 1880) attribute the importance early attached to odours to religious reasons. He says that it was believed that the gods, being spirits, neither required nor desired solid offerings, but that the ethereal nature of the ascending fragrance was gratifying and sustaining to them. Miss Lambert quotes an account of the tribes of Florida “setting on the tops of the trees, as offerings to the sun, skins of deer filled with the best fruits of the country, crowned with flowers and sweet herbs.” Among the Aztecs of Mexico the festival of the goddess of flowers, Coatlicue, was kept by Xochenanqui, or traders in flowers. Offerings of “curiously woven garlands” were made, and it was “forbidden to everyone to smell the flowers of which they were composed before their dedication to the goddess.” The Tahitians had the idea that “the scent was the spirit of the offering and corresponded to the spirit of man,” and therefore they laid sweet-scented offerings before their dead till burial, believing that the spirit still hovered near. These instances show clearly the high regard in which delicate odours were once held.
Herbs and flowers were early used in rites and ceremonies of the Church. Miss Lambert quotes from a poem of Fortunatus, Bishop of Poitiers. “When winter binds the earth with ice, all the glory of the field perishes with its flowers. But in the spring-time when the Lord overcame Hell, bright grass shoots up and buds come forth.... Gather these first-fruits and you bear them to the churches and wreath the altars with them till they glow with colour. The golden crocus is mingled with the purple violet, dazzling scarlet is relieved by gleaming white, deep blue blends with green.... One triumphs in its radiant beauty, another conquers by its sweet perfume; gems and incense bow before them.” In England, the flowers for the Church were grown under the special care of the Sacristan, and as early as the ninth century there was a “gardina sacristæ” at Winchester.[1] Miss Amherst gives a most careful description of the several gardens into which the whole monastery enclosures were often divided, and herbs were specially grown in the kitchen-garden and in the Infirmarian’s garden, the latter, of course, being devoted to herbs for healing. Many herbs were introduced by the Romans, among them Coriander, Chervil, Cumin, Featherfew, Fennel, Lovage, Mallow, Mint, Parsley, Rue and Mustard. Some of these are supposed to have died out after the Romans withdrew from England and have been re-introduced, but it is certain that they have been for a very long time cultivated in England. I cannot refrain from referring to a miracle, an account of which is quoted by Miss Amherst from Dugdale’s “Monasticon” (vol. i. p. 473, new ed.), which was wrought at the tomb of St Ethelreda—:
A “servant to a certain priest was gathering herbs in the garden on the Lord’s Day, when the wood in her hand, and with which she desired to pluck the herbs unlawfully, so firmly adhered (to her hand) that no man could pluck it out for the space of five years.” At the end of this time she was miraculously healed at the tomb, which was much revered by the people.
Banks and benches of mould, fronted with stone or brick, and planted on the top with sweet-smelling herbs, were made in all fifteenth-century gardens. Later, again, Bacon recommends alleys to be planted with “those which perfume the air most delightfully being trodden upon and crushed... to have the pleasure when you walk or tread.” In his “Pastime of Pleasure” (1554) Stephen Hawes speaks of:—
In divers knottes of marveylous greatnes
Rampande lyons, stode by wonderfully
Made all of herbes, with dulset sweetnes
With many dragons, of marveylous likenes
Of divers floures, made full craftely.
More modern still is the delightful notion of a sun-dial made of herbs and flowers, that will mark the time of day by the opening and closing of their blossoms. Linnæus had such a dial, with each plant so placed that at each successive hour a flower should open or fold up. Ingram[2] gives an appropriate list for this purpose, beginning with Goats’ Beard, which he says opens at 3 A.M. and shuts at 9 A.M., and ending with Chickweed whose stars are not disclosed till 9.15 A.M., when they display themselves for exactly twelve hours. Andrew Marvell wrote these pretty lines on this device:—
How well the skilful gardener drew
Of flow’rs and herbs this dial new;
Where, from above the milder sun,
Does through a fragrant zodiack run,
And, as it works, th’ industrious bee
Computes its time as well as we!
How could such sweet and wholesome hours
Be reckon’d but with herbs and flow’rs!
The Garden.
The Quarterly for June 1842 quotes this charming description of a garden in which herbs were not disregarded. “Quaint devices of all kinds are found here. Here is a sun-dial of flowers arranged according to the time of day at which they open and close. Here are peacocks and lions in livery of Lincoln green. Here are berceaux and harbours, and covered alley and enclosures containing the primest of the carnations and cloves in set order, and miniature canals that carry down a stream of pure water to the fish ponds below.... From thence (the shrubbery) winds a path, the deliciæ of the garden, planted with such herbs as yield their perfume when trodden upon and crushed.... It were tedious to follow up the long shady path not broad enough for more than two—the lovers’ walk.” The reviewer himself continues in a less sentimental strain, and his observations make a very proper introduction to a book on Herbs.
“The olitory or herb-garden is a part of our horticulture now comparatively neglected, and yet once the culture and culling of simples was as much a part of female education as the preserving and tying down of ‘rasps and apricocks.’ There was not a Lady Bountiful in the kingdom but made her dill-tea and diet-drink from herbs of her own planting; and there is a neatness and prettiness about our thyme, and sage, and mint and marjoram, that might yet, we think, transfer them from the patronage of the blue serge to that of the white muslin apron. Lavender and rosemary, and rue, the feathery fennel, and the bright blue borage, are all pretty bushes in their way, and might have a due place assigned to them by the hand of beauty and taste. A strip for a little herbary half-way between the flower and vegetable garden would form a very appropriate transition stratum and might be the means, by being more under the eye of the mistress, of recovering to our soups and salads some of the comparatively neglected herbs of tarragon, and French sorrel, and purslane, and chervil, and dill, and clary, and others whose place is now nowhere to be found but in the pages of the old herbalists. This little plot should be laid out, of course, in a simple, geometric pattern; and having tried the experiment, we can boldly pronounce on its success. We recommend the idea to the consideration of our lady-gardeners.”
[1] “History of Gardening in England.”
[2] “Flora Symbolica.”
CHAPTER I
OF THE CHIEF HERBS USED IN THE PRESENT TIME
J’ai des bouquets pour tous les goûts;
Venez choisir dans ma corbeille:
De plusieurs les parfums sont doux,
De tous, la vertu sans pareille.
J’ai des soucis pour les galoux;
La rose pour l’amant fidèle;
De l’éllebore pour les tous
Et pour l’amitié l’immortelle.
La petite Corbeille de fleurs.
Herbs, too, she knew, and well of each could speak
That in her garden sip’d the silv’ry dew;
Where no vain flow’r disclos’d a gaudy streak;
But herbs for use, and physic, not a few,
Of grey renown within those borders grew;
The tufted basil, pun-provoking thyme,
Fresh baum, and mary-gold of cheerful hue;
The lowly gill,[3] that never dares to climb;
And more I fain would sing, disdaining here to rhyme.
Yet euphrasy[4] may not be left unsung,
That gives dim eyes to wander leagues around;
And pungent radish, biting infant’s tongue;
And plantain ribb’d, that heals the reaper’s wound;
And marj’ram sweet, in shepherd’s posie found;
And lavender, whose spikes of azure bloom
Shall be, ere-while, in arid bundles bound
To lurk amidst the labours of her loom,
And crown her kerchiefs clean with mickle rare perfume.
The Schoolmistress.—Shenstone.
John Evelyn once wrote an essay called “Acetaria: a Discourse of Sallets,” and dedicated it to Lord Somers, the President of the Royal Society. The Dedication is highly laudatory and somewhat grandiloquent, comparing the Royal Society to King Solomon’s Temple, and declaring it established for the acquirement of “solid and useful knowledge by the Investigation of Causes, Principles, Energies, Powers and Effects of Bodies and Things visible; and to improve them for the Good and Benefit of Mankind.... And now, My Lord, I expect some will wonder what my Meaning is, to usher in a Trifle with so much magnificence, and end at last in a fine Receipt for the dressing of a Sallet with an handful of Pot-herbs! But yet, my Lord, this Subject as low and despicable as it appears challenges a Part of Natural History; and the Greatest Princes have thought it no disgrace, not only to make it their Diversion, but their Care, and to promote and encourage it in the midst of their weightiest Affairs.” This disquisition casts an unlooked-for air of dignity over the Salad-bowl! The discourse itself is very practical, and begins with the Furniture and Materials of which a Salad may be composed. Eighty-two items are mentioned, but all cannot be called strictly in order, as Oranges, Turnips, Rosemary, and Judas Tree flowers, and Mushrooms are amongst them!
In the table at the end of this list Evelyn, “by the assistance of Mr London, His Majesty’s Principal Gardener, reduced them to a competent number, not exceeding thirty-five,” though he suggests that this may be “vary’d and enlarg’d by selections from the foregoing list.”
The essay finishes with philosophical reasoning on the subject of vegetarianism. History is called upon to furnish examples of sages, of all times, favourably inclined to it, but Noah is allowed to differ on account of the “humidity of the atmosphere” after the Deluge, which must have necessitated a generous diet. Most people would think thirty-five different kinds a liberal allowance for salad herbs alone, but Abercrombie, writing in 1822, gives forty-four, and it is worthy of notice, that within the last eighty years, ox-eye daisy, yarrow, lady’s-smock, primrose and plantain were counted among them.
In this chapter, the herbs mentioned are those chiefly used nowadays; in the next chapter, these that were favourites au temps jadis. It is a difficult line to draw, for the popularity of many of them is, like themselves, evergreen, but I have tried to put in the second chapter those that have passed the zenith of their fame, though they may still ride high in public estimation.
[3] Ground-ivy.
[4] Eye-bright.
Anise (Pimpinella Anisum).
His chimney side
Could boast no gammon, salted well and dried
And hook’d behind him; but sufficient store
Of bundled anise and a cheese it bore.
The Salad. Trans. from “Virgil.”—Cowper.
In Virgil’s time Anise evidently must have been used as a spice. It is a graceful, umbelliferous plant, a native of Egypt, but the seeds will ripen in August in England if it is planted in a warm and favourable situation. Abercrombie[5] says “its chief use is to flavour soups, but Loudon[6] includes it among confectionery herbs.”
[5] “Every Man his own Gardener.”
[6] “Encyclopædia of Gardening,” 1822.
Balm (Melissa officinalis).
The several chairs of order look you scour
With juice of Balm and every precious flower.
Merry Wives of Windsor, V. v. 65.
Then Balm and Mint helps to make up
My chaplet.
The Muses Elysium.—Drayton.
My garden grew Self-heal and Balm,
And Speedwell that’s blue for an hour,
Then blossoms again, O, grievous my pain,
I’m plundered of each flower.
Devonshire Song.
The lemon-scent of Balm makes it almost the most delicious of all herbs, and it is for its fragrance that Shakespeare and Drayton have alluded to it in these passages. In the song it is mentioned for another reason, for the flowers here are used as emblems. The first verse describes a garden of fair blossoms stolen, alas! from their owner. This verse of the song shows she has planted flowers whose nature is to console—Self-heal, Balm and the Speedwell, which, after every shock, hasten to bloom again, but she is again bereft of her treasures, and finally despairs and tells us that she grows naught but weeds and the symbols of desolation. There was once a “restorative cordial” called Carmelite water, which enjoyed a great reputation, and which was composed of the spirit of Balm, Angelica root, lemon-peel and nutmeg. In the early part of the last century, Balm wine was made, and was described as being “light and agreeable,” but now Balm is seldom used, except when claret-cup is improved by its flavour. A most curious legend is told by Aubrey[7] of the Wandering Jew, the scene being on the Staffordshire moors. “One Whitsun evening, overcome with thirst, he knocked at the door of a Staffordshire cottager, and craved of him a cup of small beer. The cottager, who was wasted with a lingering consumption, asked him in, and gave him the desired refreshment. After finishing the beer, Ahasuerus asked his host the nature of the disease he was suffering from, and being told that the doctors had given him up, said, ‘Friend, I will tell thee what thou shalt do.’ He then told him to go into the garden the next morning on rising, and gather three Balm leaves, and to put them into a cup of small beer. He was to drink as often as he needed, and refill the cup when it was empty, and put in fresh Balm leaves every fourth day, and, ‘before twelve days shall be past, thy disease shall be cured and thy body altered.’ So saying, and declining to eat, he departed and was never seen again. But the cottager gathered his Balm-leaves, followed the prescription of the Wandering Jew, and before twelve days were passed was a new man.”
[7] “Miscellanies.”
Sweet Basil (Ocymum basilium) and Bush Basil (O. minimum).
Madonna, wherefore hast thou sent to me
Sweet basil and mignonette?
Embleming love and health which never yet
In the same wreath might be.
To Emilia Viviani.—Shelley.
Basil is beloved of the poets, and the story of Isabella and the Basil-pot keeps the plant in memory, where it is itself never, or very rarely, seen. The opening lines of Drayton’s pretty poem beginning with Claia’s speech:—
Here damask roses, white and red,
Out of my lap first take I—
are well known, and it is a pity that the whole of it is not oftener quoted. Two maidens make rival chaplets, and then examine the store of simples just gathered by a hermit. Claia chooses her flowers for beauty, Lelipa hers for scent, and Clarinax, the hermit, plucks his for their “virtue” in medicine. Lelipa says:—
A chaplet, me, of herbs I’ll make,
Than which, though yours be braver,
Yet this of mine, I’ll undertake,
Shall not be short in favour.
With Basil then I will begin,
Whose scent is wondrous pleasing.
and a goodly number of sweet-herbs follows.
Parkinson[8] says of it, “The ordinary Basill is in a manner wholly spent to make sweete, or washing waters, among other sweet herbes, yet sometimes it is put into nosegays. The Physicall properties are to procure a cheerfull and merry hearte, whereunto the seede is chiefly used in powder.” With such “physicall properties” Basil is too much neglected nowadays. He also refers to the extraordinary but very general idea that it bred scorpions. “Let me, before I leave, relate unto you a pleasant passage between Francisius Marchio, as Advocate of the State of Genoa sent in embassage to the Duke of Milan, and the said Duke, who, refusing to heare his message or to agree unto the conditions proposed, brought an handfull of Basill and offered it to him, who, demanding of him what he meant thereby, answered him, that the properties of that hearbe was, that being gently handled, it gave a pleasant smell, but being hardly wrung and bruised, would breed scorpions, with which witty answer the Duke was so pleased that he confirmed the conditions, and sent him honourably home. It is also observed that scorpions doe much rest and abide under these pots and vessells wherein Basill is planted.” Culpepper,[9] too, had suspicions about it. “This is the herb which all authors are together by the ears about and rail at one another (like lawyers). Galen and Dioscorides hold it not fitting to be taken inwardly, and Chrysippus rails at it with downright Billingsgate rhetoric; Pliny and the Arabians defend it. Something is the matter, this herb and rue will not grow together, no, nor near one another, and we know rue is as great an enemy to poison as any that grows.” Tusser[10] puts both Basils in his list of “strewing herbs,” and also says:—
Fine basil desireth it may be her lot,
To grow as the gilliflower, trim in a pot;
That ladies and gentles, to whom ye do serve,
May help her, as needeth, poor life to preserve.
May’s Husbandry.
To which (in Mavor’s edition, 1812) is appended this prim note, “Garden basil, if stroked, leaves a grateful smell on the hand, and the author insinuates that it receives fresh life from being touched by a fair lady.” Both basils are annuals, though Bush Basil may occasionally live through the winter. They are small plants with oval leaves and white, labiate flowers. A modern gardener writes that sweet basil has the flavour of cloves, that it is always demanded by French cooks, and that it is much used to flavour soups, and occasionally salads. M. de la Quintinye,[11] director of the gardens to Louis XIV., shows that over two hundred years ago French cooks were of the same mind about basil as they are to-day; besides mentioning it for the uses just named, he adds, “It is likewise used in ragouts, especially dry ones, for which reason we take care to keep some for winter.” An Italian name for it is Bacia-Nicola.
[ [8] “Earthly Paradise,” 1629.
[ [9] English Physitian, popularly known as Culpepper’s Herbal, 1652.
[10] “Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry.”
[11] The Complete Gardener. Trans. by T. Evelyn, 1693.
Borage (Borago officinalis).
Here is sweet water, and borage for blending,
Comfort and courage to drink to your fill.
N. Hopper.
This reference to Borage touches a long-lived belief—
I, borage,
Give courage—
briefly states one reason of its popularity, which has lasted ever since Pliny praised the plant; besides this, it was supposed to exhilarate the spirits and drive away melancholy. De Gubernatis[12] only found one charge against it, amid universal praise, and this is in a Tuscan ninnerella, a cradle song, where it is accused of frightening a baby! But this evidence is absolutely unsupported by any tradition, and he considers it worthless. Borage was sometimes called Bugloss by the old writers.[13] In 1810 Dr Thornton calls it “one of the four grand cardiac plants,” but shows a lamentable lack of faith himself. Dr Fernie[14] finds that Borage has a “cucumber-like odour,” and that its reputed powers of “refreshing” and “invigorating” are not all due to the imagination; “The fresh juice,” he says, “affords thirty per cent. of nitrate of potash. Thornton had already commented on the nitre it contains, and to prove this he advises that the dried plant be thrown on the fire, when it emits a sort of coruscation, with a slight detonation.” Personal experience teaches that this is easier to observe if the plant is set on fire and burned by itself. Borage might be grown for the sake of its lovely blue flowers alone, and Parkinson gives it a place in his “Earthly Paradise,” because, though it is “wholly in a manner spent for Physicall properties or for the Pot, yet the flowers have alwaies been interposed among the flowers of women’s needle-work”—a practice which would add to the beauty of modern embroidery. He adds that the flowers “of gentlewomen are candid for comfits,” showing that they did not allow sentiment to soar uncontrolled! Bees love borage, and it yields excellent honey, yet another reason for growing it. In the early part of the nineteenth century the young tops were still sometimes boiled for a pot-herb, but in the present day, if used at all, it is put into claret-cup. Till quite lately it was an ingredient in “cool tankards” of wine or cider.
[12] La Mythologie des Plantes.
[13] Family Herbal, 1810.
[14] Herbal Simples, 1895.
Bugloss (Anchusa officinalis).
So did the maidens with their various flowers
Deck up their windows, and make neat their bowers;
Using such cunning as they did dispose
The ruddy piny (peony) with the lighter rose,
The monkshood with the bugloss, and entwine
The white, the blue, the flesh-like columbine
With pinks, sweet williams.
Britannia’s Pastorals, Book II.—W. Browne.
A spiny stem of bugloss flowers,
Deep blue upon the outer towers.
Winchester Castle.—N. Hopper.
Gerarde put Bugloss in one chapter, and Alkanet or Wild Bugloss in another, but nowadays Bugloss or Alkanet are names for the same plant, Anchusa officinalis. The drawings of his Bugloss resemble our Alkanet much more closely than they do any other plant called Bugloss, such as Lycopsis arvensis, small Bugloss, or Echium vulgare, Viper’s Bugloss. The old herbalists, however, were most confusing on the subject. They apply the name Bugloss alternately to Borago officinalis and to different varieties of Anchusa, and then speak of Buglossum as if it were a different species! Evelyn describes it as being “in nature much like Borage but something more astringent,” and recommends the flowers of both as a conserve, for they are “greatly restorative.” As Hogg says that Anchusa officinalis had formerly “a great reputation as a cordial,” Evelyn’s description applies to this plant; we may take it that this is the Bugloss he was thinking of. It is a good plant for a “wild garden,” but has a great tendency to spread. I have found it growing wild in Cornwall. Gerarde tells us that the roots of Anchusa Tinctoria were used to colour waters, syrups, and jellies, and then follows a line of scandal—“The gentlewomen of France doe paint their faces with these roots, as it is said.” Rouge is still made from Alkanet.
Burnet (Poterium Sanguisorba).
The even mead, that erst brought sweetly forth
The freckled Cowslip, Burnet and green Clover.
Henry V., V. ii. 48.
Burnet has “two little leives like unto the winges of birdes, standing out as the bird setteth her winges out when she intendeth to flye.... Ye Duchmen call it Hergottes berdlen, that is God’s little berde, because of the colour that it hath in the toppe.” This is Turner’s[15] information. He has a pleasant style, and tells us out-of-the-way facts or customs in a charming manner. Burnet is the first of the three plants that Sir Francis Bacon desired to be set in alleys, “to perfume the air most delightfully, being trodden upon and crushed.” The others were wild thyme and water-mint. It was a Salad-herb, and has (like Borage) a flavour of cucumber, but it has, most undeservedly, gone out of fashion. The taste is “somewhat warm, and the leaves should be cut young, or else they are apt to be tough. Culpepper and Parkinson advise that a few leaves should be added to a cup of claret wine because” it is “a helpe to make the heart merrie.” Canon Ellacombe[16] says it was “and still is valued as a forage plant that will grow and keep fresh all the winter in dry, barren pastures, thus giving food for sheep when other food was scarce. It has occasionally been cultivated, but the result has not been very satisfactory, except on very poor land, though, according to the Woburn experiments, as reported by Sinclair, it contains a larger amount of nutritive matter in the spring than most of the grasses. It has brown flowers from which it is supposed to derive its name (Brunetto).”
[15] Turner’s Herbal is beautifully illustrated; five initial letters from it are [here] reproduced.
[16] “Plant-lore and Garden-Craft of Shakespeare.”
INITIAL LETTERS FROM TURNER’S “HERBAL”
Caraway (Carum carvi).
Shallow. Now, you shall see my orchard, where, in an arbour we will eat a last year’s Pippin of my own grafting, with a dish of Caraways, and so forth. II. Henry IV. v. 3.
In Elizabethan days, Caraway Seeds were appreciated at dessert, and Canon Ellacombe says that the custom of serving roast apples with a little saucerful of Caraway Seed is still kept up at some of the London livery dinners. It was the practice to put them among baked fruits or into bread-cakes, and they were also “made into comfits.” In cakes and comfits they are used to-day, and in Germany I have seen them served with potatoes fried in slices. The roots were boiled and “eaten as carrots,” and made a “very welcome and delightful dish to a great many,” though some found them rather strong flavoured. “The[17] Duchemen call it Mat kumell or Wishenkumel and the Freses, Hofcumine. It groweth in great plentye in Freseland in the meadows there betweene Marienhoffe and Werden, hard by the sea banke.”
[17] “Turner’s Herbal,” 1538.
Celery (Apium graveolens).
This is quite without romance. The older herbalists did not know it and Evelyn says: “Sellery... was formerly a stranger with us (nor very long since in Italy itself).... Nor is it a distinct species of smallage or Macedonian Parsley, tho’ somewhat more hot and generous, by its frequent transplanting, and thereby render’d sweeter scented.” For its “high and grateful taste, it is ever plac’d in the middle of the grand sallet, at our great men’s tables, and Proctor’s Feasts, as the grace of the whole board.” But though Parkinson did not know the plant under this name, he did see some of the first introduced into England, and gives an interesting account of this introduction to “sweete Parsley or sweet Smallage.... This resembles sweete Fennell.... The first that ever I saw was in a Venetian Ambassador’s garden in the spittle yard, near Bishop’s Gate Streete. The first year it is planted with us it is sweete and pleasant, especially while it is young, but after it has grown high and large hath a stronger taste of smallage, and so likewise much more the following yeare. The Venetians used to prepare it for meate many waies, both the herbe and roote eaten rawe, or boyled or fryed to be eaten with meate, or the dry’d herb poudered and strewn upon meate; but most usually either whited and so eaten raw with pepper and oyle as a dainty sallet of itselfe, or a little boyled or stewed... the taste of the herbe being a little warming, but the seede much more.”
Chervil (Scandix Cerefolium).
Chibolles and Chervelles and ripe chiries manye.
Piers Plowman.
Chervil was much used by the French and Dutch “boyled or stewed in a pipkin. De la Quintinye recommends it to give a ‘perfuming rellish’ to the salad, and Evelyn says the ‘Sweete (and as the French call it Musque) Spanish Chervile,’ is the best and ought ‘never to be wanting in our sallets,’ for it is ‘exceeding wholesome and charming to the spirits.’... This (as likewise Spinach) is used in tarts and serves alone for divers sauces.”
Ciboules, Chiboules or Chibbals (Allium Ascalonium).
Acorns, plump as Chibbals.
The Gipsies Metamorphosed.—Ben Jonson.
Ciboules are a small kind of onion; De la Quintinye says, “Onions degenerated.” From the reference to them in Piers Plowman, they were evidently in common use here in the time of Langlande. The French gardener adds that they are “propagated only by seeds of the bignes of a corn of ordinary gun-powder,” and Mr Britten identifies them with Scallions or Shallot (A. ascalonium).
Cives, or Chives, or Seives (Allium Schænoprasum).
Straightways follow’d in
A case of small musicians, with a din
Of little Hautbois, whereon each one strives
To show his skill; they all were made of seives,
Excepting one, which puff’d the player’s face,
And was a Chibole, serving for the bass.
Britannia’s Pastorals, Book III.
Cives and Ciboules are often mentioned together, as in this account of King Oberon’s feast. The leaves are green and hollow and look like rushes en miniature, and would serve admirably for elfin Hautbois. Miss Amherst[18] says that they are mentioned in a list of herbs (Sloane MS., 1201) found “at the beginning of a book of cookery recipes, fifteenth century.” She also tells us that when Kalm came to England (May 1748) he noticed them among the vegetables most grown in the nursery-gardens round London. They were “esteemed milder than onions,” and of a “quick rellish,” but their fame has declined in the last hundred years. Loudon says that the leaves are occasionally used to flavour soup, salads and omelettes—unlike ciboules, the bulb is not used—but the chief purpose for which I have heard them required is to mix with the food for young guinea-fowls and chickens.
[18] “History of Gardening in England.”
Coriander (Coriandrum sativum).
And Coriander last to these succeeds
That hangs on slightest threads her trembling seeds.
The Salad.—Cowper.
The chief interest attached to Coriander is that in the Book of Numbers, xi. 7, Manna is compared to the seed. It was originally introduced from the East, but is now naturalised in Essex and other places, where it has long been cultivated for druggists and confectioners. The seeds are quite round, like tiny balls, and Hogg remarks that they become fragrant by drying, and the longer they are kept the more fragrant they become. “If taken oute of measure it doth trouble a manne’s witt, with great jeopardye of madnes.”[19] Nowadays one comes across them oftenest in little round pink and white comfits for children.
[19] Turner.
Cumin (Cuminum cyminum).
Cummin good for eyes,
The roses reigning the pride of May,
Sharp isope good for greene woundes remedies.[20]
Cumin is also mentioned in the Bible by Isaiah; and also in the New Testament, as one of the plants that were tithed. It is very seldom met with, but the seeds have the same properties as caraway seeds. Gerarde says it has “little jagged leaves, very finely cut into small parcels,” and “spoky tufts” of red or purplish flowers. “The root is slender, which perisheth when it hath ripened his seed,” and it delights in a hot soil. He recommends it to be boyled together with wine and barley meale “to the forme of a pultis” for a variety of ailments. In Germany the seeds are put into bread and they figure in folklore. De Gubernatis says it gave rise to a saying among the Greeks: “Le cumin symbolisait, chez les Grecs, ce qui est petit. Des avares, ils disaient, qu’ils auraient même partagé le cumin.”
[20] Muiopotmos.—Spenser.