"Much wetnes, hog-rooting, and land out of hart makes Thistles a number foorthwith to upstart. If Thistles so growing proove lustie and long, It signifieth land to be hartie and strong."
October's Husbandry (13).
If the Thistles were not so common, and if we could get rid of the associations they suggest, there are probably few of our wild plants that we should more admire: they are stately in their foliage and habit, and some of their flowers are rich in colour, and the Thistledown, which carries the seed far and wide, is very beautiful, and was once considered useful as a sign of rain, for "if the down flyeth off Coltsfoot, Dandelyon, or Thistles when there is no winde, it is a signe of rain."—Coles.
It had still another use in rustic divination—
"Upon the various earth's embroidered gown,
There is a weed upon whose head grows down,
Sow Thistle 'tis y'clept, whose downy wreath
If anyone can blow off at a breath
We deem her for a maid."—Browne's Brit. Past., i, 4.
But it is owing to these pretty Thistledowns that the plant becomes a most undesirable neighbour, for they carry the seed everywhere, and wherever it is carried, it soon vegetates, and a fine crop of Thistles very quickly follows. In this way, if left to themselves, the Thistles will soon monopolize a large extent of country, to the extinction of other plants, as they have done in parts of the American prairies, and as they did in Australia, till a most stringent Act of Parliament was passed about twenty years ago, imposing heavy penalties upon all who neglected to destroy the Thistles on their land. For these reasons we cannot admit the Thistle into the garden, at least not our native Thistles; but there are some foreigners which may well be admitted. There are the handsome yellow Thistles of the South of Europe (Scolymus), which besides their beauty have a classical interest. "Hesiod elegantly describing the time of year, says,
ἠμος δε σκολυμος τ'ανθει,
when the Scolymus flowers, i.e., in hot weather or summer ("Op. et dies," 582). This plant crowned with its golden flowers is abundant throughout Sicily."—Hogg's Classical Plants of Sicily. There is the Fish-bone Thistle (Chamæpeuce diacantha) from Syria, a very handsome plant, and, like most of the Thistles, a biennial; but if allowed to flower and go to seed, it will produce plenty of seedlings for a succession of years. And there is a grand scarlet Thistle from Mexico, the Erythrolena conspicua ("Sweet," vol. ii. p. 134), which must be almost the handsomest of the family, and which was grown in England fifty years ago, but has been long lost. There are many others that may deserve a place as ornamental plants, but they find little favour, for "they are only Thistles."
Any notice of the Thistle would be imperfect without some mention of the Scotch Thistle. It is the one point in the history of the plant that protects it from contempt. We dare not despise a plant which is the honoured badge of our neighbours and relations, the Scotch; which is ennobled as the symbol of the Order of the Thistle, that claims to be the most ancient of all our Orders of high honour; and which defies you to insult it or despise it by its proud mottoes, "Nemo me impune lacessit," "Ce que Dieu garde, est bien gardé." What is the true Scotch Thistle even the Scotch antiquarians cannot decide, and in the uncertainty it is perhaps safest to say that no Thistle in particular can claim the sole honour, but that it extends to every member of the family that can be found in Scotland.[292:1]
Shakespeare has noticed the love of the bee for the Thistle, and it seems that it is for other purposes than honey gathering that he finds the Thistle useful. For "a beauty has the Thistle, when every delicate hair arrests a dew-drop on a showery April morning, and when the purple blossom of a roadside Thistle turns its face to Heaven and welcomes the wild bee, who lies close upon its flowerets on the approach of some storm cloud until its shadow be past away. For with unerring instinct the bee well knows that the darkness is but for a moment, and that the sun will shine out again ere long."—Lady Wilkinson.