The Folk-lore of Plants

Some plants, such as flea-bane and wolf's-bane, refer to the reputed property of the plant to keep off or injure the animal named,[5] and there is a long list of plants which derived their names from their real or imaginary medicinal virtues, many of which illustrate the old doctrine of signatures. Birds, again, like animals, have suggested various names, and among some of the best-known ones may be mentioned the goose-foot, goose-grass, goose-tongue. Shakespeare speaks of cuckoo-buds, and there is cuckoo's-head, cuckoo-flower, and cuckoo-fruit, besides the stork's-bill and crane's-bill. Bees are not without their contingent of names; a popular name of the Delphinium grandiflorum being the bee-larkspur, "from the resemblance of the petals, which are studded with yellow hairs, to the humble-bee whose head is buried in the recesses of the flower." There is the bee-flower (Ophrys apifera), because the, "lip is in form and colour so like a bee, that any one unacquainted therewith would take it for a living bee sucking of the flower." In addition to the various classes of names already mentioned, there are a rich and very varied assortment found in most counties throughout the country, many of which have originated in the most amusing and eccentric way. Thus "butter and eggs" and "eggs and bacon" are applied to several plants, from the two shades of yellow in the flower, and butter-churn to the Nuphar luteum, from the shape of the fruit. A popular term for Nepeta glechoma is "hen and chickens," and "cocks and hens" for the Plantago lanceolata. A Gloucestershire nickname for the Plantago media is fire-leaves, and the hearts'-ease has been honoured with all sorts of romantic names, such as "kiss me behind the garden gate;" and "none so pretty" is one of the popular names of the saxifrage. Among the names of the Arum may be noticed "parson in the pulpit," "cows and calves," "lords and ladies," and "wake-robin." The potato has a variety of names, such as leather-jackets, blue-eyes, and red-eyes.