Le Grànd Consoul, or comfrey. Of this the root is the part used.
La Rue. Rue, which was supposed to have a potent effect on the eyes, and bestow second sight.
L’Alliène, or wormwood.
La Marjolaine, or marjoram, and
La Campana, or vervain, the “holy herb” of the Druids.
This list by no means exhausts the plants possessed of healing powers.
George Métivier, in his Souvenirs Historiques, chapter IV. and II., speaks of a sacred briar, called “pied-de-chat,” worn as a waist-belt as an infallible talisman against witchcraft. When a man was afflicted with boils, he had to pass, fasting and in silence, for nine consecutive mornings, under an arch of this same briar. The green sprigs of broom, however, are believed to be equally efficacious in averting the evil influence of spells.
In planting a bed of the smaller herbs, to render them thoroughly efficacious they should be planted under a volley of minor oaths, such as “goderabetin” or “godzamin.” It is not expedient that the oaths should be too blood curdling.
George Métivier alludes to this, and says he himself knew old gardeners who made a constant practice of this prehistoric method, and quotes Pliny, Vol. X., p. 77: “He was enjoined to sow (basil) with curses and oaths, and then, so that it should succeed, to beat the ground.”
Editor’s Note.—“Mal de Poule.”—In St. Martin’s parish lived an old woman who had an infallible cure for sick headaches. The patient was put to bed, and a live chicken, with its beak stuffed with parsley, enveloped in a cloth, was tied on his head. She then muttered a prayer over it, and tied it again, still more firmly, round the patient’s forehead. As the chicken died the headache ceased.—From Miss Thoume.