HONEYSUCKLE.

(1)Hero.And bid her steal into the pleached bower
Where Honeysuckles, ripen'd by the sun,
Forbid the sun to enter.
Much Ado About Nothing, act iii, sc. 1 (7).
(2)Ursula.So angle we for Beatrice; who even now
Is couched in the Woodbine coverture.
Ibid. (29).
(3)Titania.Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms.
So doth the Woodbine the sweet Honeysuckle
Gently entwist; the Female Ivy so
Enrings the barky fingers of the Elm.
Midsummer Night's Dream, act iv, sc. 1 (47).
(4)Hostess.O thou Honeysuckle villain.
2nd Henry IV, act ii, sc. 1 (52).
(5)Oberon.I know a bank where the wild Thyme blows,
Where Oxlips and the nodding Violet grows,
Quite over-canopied with luscious Woodbine.
Midsummer Night's Dream, act ii, sc. 1 (249).

I have joined together here the Woodbine and the Honeysuckle, because there can be little doubt that in Shakespeare's time the two names belonged to the same plant,[126:1] and that the Woodbine was (where the two names were at all discriminated, as in No. [3]), applied to the plant generally, and Honeysuckle to the flower. This seems very clear by comparing together Nos. [1] and [2]. In earlier writings the name was applied very loosely to almost any creeping or climbing plant. In an Anglo-Saxon Vocabulary of the eleventh century it is applied to the Wild Clematis ("Viticella—Weoden-binde"); while in Archbishop Ælfric's "Vocabulary" of the tenth century it is applied to the Hedera nigra, which may be either the Common or the Ground Ivy ("Hedera nigra—Wude-binde"); and in the Herbarium and Leechdom books of the twelfth century it is applied to the Capparis or Caper-plant, by which, however (as Mr. Cockayne considers), the Convolvulus Sepium is meant. After Shakespeare's time again the words began to be used confusedly. Milton does not seem to have been very clear in the matter. In "Paradise Lost" he makes our first parents "wind the Woodbine round this arbour" (perhaps he had Shakespeare's arbour in his mind); and in "Comus" he tells us of—

"A bank
With ivy-canopied, and interwove
With flaunting Honeysuckle."[126:2]

While in "Lycidas" he tells of—

"The Musk Rose and the well-attired Woodbine."

And we can scarcely suppose that he would apply two such contrary epithets as "flaunting" and "well-attired" to the same plant. And now the name, as of old, is used with great uncertainty, and I have heard it applied to many plants, and especially to the small sweet-scented Clematis (C. flammula).

But with the Honeysuckle there is no such difficulty. The name is an old one, and in its earliest use was no doubt indifferently applied to many sweet-scented flowers (the Primrose amongst them); but it was soon attached exclusively to our own sweet Honeysuckle of the woods and hedges. We have two native species (Lonicera periclymenum and L. xylosteum), and there are about eighty exotic species, but none of them sweeter or prettier than our own, which, besides its fragrant flowers, has pretty, fleshy, red fruit.

The Honeysuckle has ever been the emblem of firm and fast affection—as it climbs round any tree or bush, that is near it, not only clinging to it faster than Ivy, but keeping its hold so tight as to leave its mark in deep furrows on the tree that has supported it. The old writers are fond of alluding to this. Bullein in "The Book of Simples," 1562, says very prettily, "Oh, how swete and pleasant is Wood-binde, in woodes or arbours, after a tender, soft rain: and how friendly doe this herbe, if I maie so name it, imbrace the bodies, armes, and branches of trees, with his long winding stalkes, and tender leaves, openyng or spreading forthe his swete Lillis, like ladie's fingers, emōg the thornes or bushes," and there is no doubt from the context that he is here referring to the Honeysuckle. Chaucer gives the crown of Woodbine to those who were constant in love—