Gerard relates how trees, actually bearing shells which open and hatch out barnacle geese, occur in the “Orchades[20],” but he states that on this point he has no first-hand knowledge. He proceeds, however, to remark, “But what our eies have seene, and hands have touched, we shall declare. There is a small Ilande in Lancashire called the Pile of Foulders, wherein are found the broken peeces of old and brused ships, some whereof have beene cast thither by shipwracke, and also the trunks or bodies with the branches of old and rotten trees, cast up there likewise: wheron is found a certaine spume or froth, that in time breedeth unto certaine shels, in shape like those of the muskle, but sharper pointed, and of a whitish colour; wherein is conteined a thing in forme like a lace of silke finely woven, as it were togither, of a whitish colour; one ende whereof is fastned unto the inside of the shell, even as the fish of Oisters and Muskles are; the other ende is made fast unto the belly of a rude masse or lumpe, which in time commeth to the shape and forme of a Bird: when it is perfectly formed, the shel gapeth open, and the first thing that appeereth is the foresaid lace or string; next come the legs of the Birde hanging out; and as it groweth greater, it openeth the shell by degrees, till at length it is all come foorth, and hangeth onely by the bill; in short space after it commeth to full maturitie, and falleth into the sea, where it gathereth feathers, and groweth to a foule, bigger then a Mallard, and lesser than a Goose.”
The fable of the Goose Tree was rejected in the later editions of Gerard’s ‘Herball,’ published after the author’s death. It reappears, however, late in the seventeenth century, in the ‘Historia Naturalis’ of John Jonston. The legend is of respectable antiquity, being found in various early chronicles. Sebastian Muenster, for example, in his ‘Cosmographia[21],’ printed at Basle in 1545, refers to it as recorded by previous writers, and figures a tree with pendent fruits, out of which geese are dropping into a lake or stream.
Text-fig. 54. “The breede of Barnakles” [Gerard, The Herball, 1597].
Hector Boethius [Boece] in his Scottish Chronicle gives a quaint account of the origin of geese from driftwood in the sea, “in the small boris and hollis” of which “growis small wormis. First thay schaw thair heid and feit, and last of all they schaw thair plum is and wyngis. Finally quhen thay ar cumyn to the iust mesure and quantite of geis, thay fle in the aire, as othir fowlis dois[22].”
It is rather surprising to find that William Turner was a believer in the same myth, although, unlike Gerard, he took great pains to satisfy himself of the truth of the story, which he seems to have approached with quite an open mind. His account is as follows:—
“When after a certain time the firwood masts or planks or yard-arms of a ship have rotted on the sea, then fungi, as it were, break out upon them first, in which in course of time one may discern evident forms of birds, which afterwards are clothed with feathers, and at last become alive and fly. Now lest this should seem fabulous to anyone, besides the common evidence of all the long-shore men of England, Ireland, and Scotland, that renowned historian Gyraldus, ... bears witness that the generation of the Bernicles is none other than this. But inasmuch as it seemed hardly safe to trust the vulgar and by reason of the rarity of the thing I did not quite credit Gyraldus, ... I took counsel of a certain man, whose upright conduct, often proved by me, had justified my trust, a theologian by profession and an Irishman by birth, Octavian by name, whether he thought Gyraldus worthy of belief in this affair. Who, taking oath upon the very Gospel which he taught, answered that what Gyraldus had reported of the generation of this bird was absolutely true, and that with his own eyes he had beholden young, as yet but rudely formed, and also handled them, and, if I were to stay in London for a month or two, that he would take care that some growing chicks should be brought in to me[23].”
The Goose Tree is also figured by de l’Obel and d’Aléchamps, but it is refreshing to find that Colonna in his ‘Phytobasanos’ (1592) flatly denies the truth of the legend.
The importance of Gerard’s ‘Herball’ in the history of botany is chiefly due to an improved edition, brought out by Thomas Johnson in 1633, thirty-six years after the work was originally published. Johnson was an apothecary in London, and cultivated a physic garden on Snow Hill. His first botanical work was a short account of the plants collected by members of the Apothecaries’ Company on an excursion in Kent. This is of interest as being the earliest memoir of the kind published in England. Later on, descriptions of botanical tours in the west of England, and in Wales, appeared from his pen. But it is as the editor of Gerard that he is chiefly remembered. He greatly enlarged the ‘Herball,’ and illustrated it with Plantin’s wood-cuts. His edition contained an account of no less than 2850 plants. Johnson also corrected numerous errors, and the whole work, transformed by him, rose to a much higher grade of value. It was reprinted, without alteration, in 1636.