[75] For subsequent editions see [Bibliography of Herbals], p. [211].
CHAPTER IV
GERARD’S HERBAL
“If odours may worke satisfaction, they are so soveraigne in plants and so comfortable that no confection of the apothecaries can equall their excellent vertue.”—Gerard’s Herbal, 1597.
When one looks at the dingy, if picturesque, thoroughfare of Fetter Lane it is difficult to realise that it was once the site of Gerard’s garden, and it is pleasant to remember that the city of London in those far-off days was as noted for the beauty of its gardens as for its stately houses. The owner of this particular garden in Fetter Lane is the most famous of all the English herbalists. His Herbal,[76] which was published in 1597, gripped the imagination of the English garden-loving world, and now, after the lapse of three hundred years, it still retains its hold on us. There are English-speaking people the world over who may know nothing of any other, but at least by name they know Gerard’s Herbal. In spite of the condemnation he has justly earned, not only in modern times, but from the critics of his own day, for having used Dr. Priest’s translation of Dodoens’s Pemptades without acknowledgment, no one can wander in the mazes of Gerard’s monumental book without succumbing to its fascination. One reads his critics with the respect due to their superior learning, and then returns to Gerard’s Herbal with the comfortable sensation of slipping away from a boring sermon into the pleasant spaciousness of an old-fashioned fairy-tale. For the majority of us are not scientific, nor do we care very much about being instructed. What we like is to read about daffodils and violets and gilliflowers and rosemary and thyme and all the other delicious old-fashioned English flowers. And when we can read about them in the matchless Elizabethan English we ask nothing more. Who that has read it once can forget those words in the preface?—
“What greater delight is there than to behold the earth apparelled with plants as with a robe of embroidered works, set with Orient pearls and garnished with great diversitie of rare and costly jewels? But these delights are in the outward senses. The principal delight is in the minde, singularly enriched with the knowledge of these visible things, setting forth to us the invisible wisdome and admirable workmanship of almighty God.”
And could any modern writer give with such simplicity and charm the “atmosphere” of the violet?
“Addressing myself unto the violets called the blacke or purple violets or March violete of the Garden, which have a great prerogative above others, not only because the minde conceiveth a certaine pleasure and recreation by smelling and handling of these most odoriferous flowers, but also that very many by these violets receive ornament and comely Grace: for there be made of them garlands for the head, nosegaies and posies, which are delightful to look on and pleasant to smell, speaking nothing of the appropriate vertues; yea Gardens themselves receive by these the greatest ornament of all, chiefest beautie and most gallant grace; and the recreation of the Minde which is taken heereby, cannot bee but verie good and honest; for flowers through their beautie, varietie of colour and exquisite formes do bring to a liberall and gentlemanly minde the remembrance of honestie, comeliness and all kindes of vertues. For it would be an unseemly thing, as a certain wise man saith, for him that doth looke upon and handle faire and beautifull things, and who frequenteth and is conversant in faire and beautifull places to have his minde not faire.”
The bones, so to speak, of Gerard’s work are, it is true, taken from Dodoens’s splendid Latin herbal, but it is Gerard’s own additions which have given the book its hold on our affections. He describes with such simplicity and charm the localities where various plants are to be found, and he gives so much contemporary folk lore that before we have been reading long we feel as though we were wandering about in Elizabethan England with a wholly delightful companion.