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271
The Folk-lore of Plants
·
T. F. Thiselton-Dyer
201
"Her
treading
would
not
bend
a
blade
of
grass,
Or
shake
the
downy
blow-ball
from
his
stalk."
In
Scotland,
one
of
the
popular
names
of
the
Angelica
sylvestris
is
"aik-skeiters,"
or
"hear-skeiters,"
because
children
shoot
oats
through
the
hollow
stems,
as
peas
are
shot
through
a
pea-shooter.
Then
there
is
the
goose-grass
(Galium
aparine),
variously
called
goose-bill,
beggar's-lice,
scratch-weed,
and
which
has
been
designated
blind-tongue,
because
"children
with
the
leaves
practise
phlebotomy
upon
the
tongue
of
those
playmates
who
are
simple
enough
to
endure
it,"
a
custom
once
very
general
in
Scotland.
[2]
The
catkins
of
the
willow
are
in
some
counties
known
as
"goslings,"
or
"goslins,"--children,
says
Halliwell,
[3]
sometimes
playing
with
them
by
putting
them
in
the
fire
and
singeing
them
brown,
repeating
verses
at
the
same
time.
One
of
the
names
of
the
heath-pea
(Lathyrus
macrorrhizus)
is
liquory-knots,
and
school-boys
in
Berwickshire
so
call
them,
for
when
dried
their
taste
is
not
unlike
that
of
the
real
liquorice.
[4]
Again,
a
children's
name
of
common
henbane
(Hyoscyamus
niger)
is
"loaves
of
bread,"
an
allusion
to
which
is
made
by
Clare
in
his
"Shepherd's
Calendar":--
"Hunting
from
the
stack-yard
sod
The
stinking
henbane's
belted
pod,
By
youth's
warm
fancies
sweetly
led
To
christen
them
his
loaves
of
bread."
A
Worcestershire
name
for
a
horse-chestnut
is
the
"oblionker
tree."
According
to
a
correspondent
of
Notes
and
Queries
(5th
Ser.
x.
177),
in
the
autumn,
when
the
chestnuts
are
falling
from
their
trunks,
boys
thread
them
on
string
and
play
a
"cob-nut"
game
with
them.
When
the
striker
is
taking
aim,
and
preparing
for
a
shot
at
his
adversary's
nut,
he
says:--
Marker
Marker
Fine marker
White-out
Fine white-out
Circle
Paint
Unmarker
Hand
Scalpel
Dice
Sieve
Purify
Undo
Redo
Start over
