_ PART I. THE PLANT-LORE OF SHAKESPEARE
MYRTLE, NARCISSUS, NETTLES
MYRTLE.
(1) Euphronius.
I was of late as petty to his ends
As is the morn-dew on the Myrtle-leaf
To his grand sea.
---Antony and Cleopatra, act iii, sc. 12 (8).
(2) Isabella.
Merciful Heaven,
Thou rather with thy sharp and sulphurous bolt
Split'st the unwedgeable and gnarled Oak
Than the soft Myrtle.
--- Measure for Measure, act ii, sc. 2 (114).
(3)
Venus, with young Adonis sitting by her,
Under a Myrtle shade began to woo him.
--- Passionate Pilgrim (143).
(4)
Then sad she hasteth to a Myrtle grove.
--- Venus and Adonis (865).
Myrtle is of course the English form of
myrtus; but the older English name was Gale, a name which is still applied to the bog-myrtle.[174:1] Though a most abundant shrub in the South of Europe, and probably introduced into England before the time of Shakespeare, the myrtle was only grown in a very few places, and was kept alive with difficulty, so that it was looked upon not only as a delicate and an elegant rarity, but as the established emblem of refined beauty. In the Bible it is always associated with visions and representations of peacefulness and plenty, and Milton most fitly uses it in the description of our first parents' "blissful bower"--
"The roofe
Of thickest covert was inwoven shade,
Laurel and Mirtle, and what higher grew
Of firm and fragrant leaf."
---
Paradise Lost, iv.
In heathen times the Myrtle was dedicated to Venus, and from this arose the custom in mediaeval times of using the flowers for bridal garlands, which thus took the place of Orange blossoms in our time.
"The lover with the Myrtle sprays
Adorns his crisped cresses."
--- DRAYTON,
Muse's Elysium.
"And I will make thee beds of Roses,
And a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroidered o'er with leaves of Myrtle."
---
Roxburghe Ballads. As a garden shrub every one will grow the Myrtle that can induce it to grow. There is no difficulty in its cultivation, provided only that the climate suits it, and the climate that suits it best is the neighbourhood of the sea. Virgil describes the Myrtles as "amantes littora myrtos," and those who have seen the Myrtle as it grows on the Devonshire and Cornish coasts will recognise the truth of his description.
FOOTNOTES:
[174:1] "Gayle; mirtus."--
Catholicon Anglicum, p. 147, with note.
NARCISSUS.
Emilia.
This garden has a world of pleasures in't,
What flowre is this?
Servant.
'Tis called Narcissus, madam.
Emilia.
That was a faire boy certaine, but a foole,
To love himselfe; were there not maides enough?
--- Two Noble Kinsmen, act ii, sc. 2 (130).
See DAFFODILS, p. 73.
NETTLES.
(1) Cordelia.
Crown'd with rank Fumiter and Furrow-weeds,
With Burdocks, Hemlock, Nettles, Cuckoo-flowers.
--- King Lear, act iv, sc. 4. (3).
(2) Queen.
Crow-flowers, Nettles, Daisies, and Long Purples.
--- Hamlet, act iv, sc. 7 (170).
(See CROW-FLOWERS.)
(3) Antonio.
He'd sow't with Nettle-seed.
--- Tempest, act ii, sc. 1 (145).
(4) Saturninus.
Look for thy reward
Among the Nettles at the Elder Tree.
--- Titus Andronicus, act ii, sc. 3 (271).
(5) Sir Toby.
How now, my Nettle of India?
--- Twelfth Night, act ii, sc. 5 (17).[176:1]
(6) King Richard.
Yield stinging Nettles to my enemies.
--- Richard II, act iii, sc. 2 (18).
(7) Hotspur.
I tell you, my lord fool, out of this Nettle, danger, we pluck
this flower, safety.
--- 1st Henry IV, act ii, sc. 3 (8).
(8) Ely.
The Strawberry grows underneath the Nettle.
--- Henry V, act i, sc. 1 (60).
(9) Cressida.
I'll spring up in his tears, an 'twere a Nettle against May.
--- Troilus and Cressida, act i, sc. 2 (190).
(10) Menenius.
We call a Nettle but a Nettle, and
The fault of fools but folly.
--- Coriolanus, act ii, sc. 1 (207).
(11) Laertes.
Goads, Thorns, Nettles, tails of wasps.
--- Winter's Tale, act i, sc. 2 (329).
(12) Iago.
If we will plant Nettles or sow Lettuce.
--- Othello, act i, sc. 3 (324).
(See HYSSOP.)
(13) Palamon.
Who do bear thy yoke
As 'twer a wreath of roses, yet is heavier
Than lead itselfe, stings more than Nettles.
--- Two Noble Kinsmen, act v, sc. 1 (101).
The Nettle needs no introduction; we are all too well acquainted with it, yet it is not altogether a weed to be despised. We have two native species (Urtica urens and U. dioica) with sufficiently strong qualities, but we have a third (U. pilulifera) very curious in its manner of bearing its female flowers in clusters of compact little balls, which is far more virulent than either of our native species, and is said by Camden to have been introduced by the Romans to chafe their bodies when frozen by the cold of Britain. The story is probably quite apocryphal, but the plant is an alien, and only grows in a few places.
Both the Latin and English names of the plant record its qualities. Urtica is from
uro, to burn; and Nettle is (etymologically) the same word as needle, and the plant is so named, not for its stinging qualities, but because at one time the Nettle supplied the chief instrument of sewing; not the instrument which holds the thread, and to which we now confine the word needle, but the thread itself, and very good thread it made. The poet Campbell says in one of his letters--"I have slept in Nettle sheets, and dined off a Nettle table-cloth, and I have heard my mother say that she thought Nettle cloth more durable than any other linen." It has also been used for making paper, and for both these purposes, as well as for rope-making, the Rhea fibre of the Himalaya, which is simply a gigantic Nettle (
Urtica or
Boehmeria nivea), is very largely cultivated. Nor is the Nettle to be despised as an article of food.[177:1] In many parts of England the young shoots are boiled and much relished. In 1596 Coghan wrote of it: "I will speak somewhat of the Nettle that Gardeners may understand what wrong they do in plucking it for the weede, seeing it is so profitable to many purposes. . . . Cunning cookes at the spring of the yeare, when Nettles first bud forth, can make good pottage with them, especially with red Nettles" ("Haven of Health," p. 86). In February, 1661, Pepys made the entry in his diary--"We did eat some Nettle porridge, which was made on purpose to-day for some of their coming, and was very good." Andrew Fairservice said of himself--"Nae doubt I should understand my trade of horticulture, seeing I was bred in the Parish of Dreepdaily, where they raise lang Kale under glass, and force the early Nettles for their spring Kale" ("Rob Roy," c. 7). Gipsies are said to cook it as an excellent vegetable, and M. Soyer tried hard, but almost in vain, to recommend it as a most dainty dish. Having so many uses, we are not surprised to find that it has at times been regularly cultivated as a garden crop, so that I have somewhere seen an account of tithe of Nettles being taken; and in the old churchwardens' account of St. Michael's, Bath, is the entry in the year 1400, "Pro Urticis venditis ad Lawrencium Bebbe, 2d."
Nettles are much used in the neighbourhood of London to pack plums and other fruit with bloom on them, so that in some market gardens they are not only not destroyed, but encouraged, and even cultivated. And this is an old practice; Lawson's advice in 1683 was--"For the gathering of all other stone-fruit, as Nectarines, Apricots, Peaches, Pear-plums, Damsons, Bullas, and such like, . . . in the bottom of your large sives where you put them, you shall lay Nettles, and likewise in the top, for that will ripen those that are most unready" ("New Orchard," p. 96).
The "Nettle of India" (No. 5) has puzzled the commentators. It is probably not the true reading; if the true reading, it may only mean a Nettle of extra-stinging quality; but it may also mean an Eastern plant that was used to produce cowage, or cow-itch. "The hairs of the pods of Mucuna pruriens, &c., constitute the substance called cow-itch, a mechanical Anthelmintic."--LINDLEY. This plant is said to have been called the Nettle of India, but I do not find it so named in Shakespeare's time.
In other points the Nettle is a most interesting plant. Microscopists find in it most beautiful objects for the microscope; entomologists value it, for it is such a favourite of butterflies and other insects, that in Britain alone upwards of thirty insects feed solely on the Nettle plant, and it is one of those curious plants which mark the progress of civilization by following man wherever he goes.[178:1]
But as a garden plant the only advice to be given is to keep it out of the garden by every means. In good cultivated ground it becomes a sad weed if once allowed a settlement. The Himalayan Boehmerias, however, are handsome, but only for their foliage; and though we cannot, perhaps, admit our roadside Dead Nettles, which however are much handsomer than many foreign flowers which we carefully tend and prize, yet the Austrian Dead Nettle (
Lamium orvala, "Bot. Mag.," v. 172) may be well admitted as a handsome garden plant.
FOOTNOTES:
[176:1] This a modern reading; the correct reading is "metal."
[177:1]
"Si forte in medio positorum abstemius herbis
Vivis et Urtica."--HORACE,
Ep. i, 10, 8.
--- "Mihi festa luce coquatar Urtica."--PERSIUS vi, 68.
[178:1] "L'ortie s'etablit partout dans les contrees temperees a la suite de l'homme pour disparaitre bientot si le lieu on elle s'est ainsi implantee cesse d'etre habite."--M. LAVAILLEE,
Sur les Arbres, &c., 1878.
NUT,
see HAZEL. _