Part 1. The Plant-Lore Of Shakespeare - Ivy, Kecksies, Knot-Grass

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_ PART I. THE PLANT-LORE OF SHAKESPEARE
IVY, KECKSIES, KNOT-GRASS

IVY.

(1) Titania.

The female Ivy so
Enrings the barky fingers of the Elm.

--- Midsummer Night's Dream, act iv, sc. 1 (48).

(2) Prospero.

That now he was
The Ivy which had hid my princely trunk
And suck'd my verdure out on't.

--- Tempest, act i, sc. 2 (85).

(3) Adriana.

If ought possess thee from me, it is dross,
Usurping Ivy, Brier, or idle Moss.

--- Comedy of Errors, act ii, sc. 2 (179).

(4) Shepherd.

They have scared away two of my best sheep, which I fear the
wolf will sooner find than the master; if anywhere I have
them 'tis by the seaside browsing of Ivy.[130:1]

---Winter's Tale, act iii, sc. 3 (66).

(5) Perithores.

His head's yellow,
Hard hayr'd, and curl'd, thicke twin'd like Ivy tops,
Not to undoe with thunder.

---Two Noble Kinsmen, act iv, sc. 2 (115).

The rich evergreen of "the Ivy never sear" (Milton) recommended it to the Romans to be joined with the Bay in the chaplets of poets--

"Hanc sine tempora circum
Inter victrices Hederam tibi serpere lauros."--VIRGIL.

"Seu condis amabile carmen
Prima feres Hederae victricis praemia."--HORACE.

And in mediaeval times it was used with Holly for Christmas decorations, so that Bullein called it "the womens Christmas Herbe." But the old writers always assumed a curious rivalry between the two--

"Holly and Ivy made a great party
Who should have the mastery
In lands where they go."

And there is a well-known carol of the time of Henry VI., which tells of the contest between the two, and of the mastery of the Holly; it is in eight stanzas, of which I extract the last four--

"Holly he hath berries as red as any Rose,
The foresters, the hunters, keep them from the does;
Ivy she hath berries as black as any Sloe,
There come the owls and eat them as they go;
Holly he hath birds, a full fair flock,
The nightingale, the popinjay, the gentle laverock;
Good Ivy, say to us, what birds hast thou?
None but the owlet that cries 'How, how!'"

Thus the Ivy was not allowed the same honour inside the houses of our ancestors as the Holly, but it held its place outside the houses as a sign of good cheer to be had within. The custom is now extinct, but formerly an Ivy bush (called a tod of Ivy) was universally hung out in front of taverns in England, as it still is in Brittany and Normandy. Hence arose two proverbs--"Good wine needs no bush," i.e., the reputation is sufficiently good without further advertisement; and "An owl in an Ivy bush," as "perhaps denoting originally the union of wisdom or prudence with conviviality, as 'Be merry and wise.'"--NARES.

The Ivy was a plant as much admired by our grandfathers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries as it is now by us. Spenser was evidently fond of it--

"And nigh thereto a little chappel stoode
Which being all with Yvy overspread
Deckt all the roofe, and shadowing the rode
Seem'd like a grove faire branched over hed."

--- F. Q., vi, v, 25.

In another place he speaks of it as--

"Wanton Yvie, flouring fayre."--F. Q., ii, v, 29.

And in another place--

"Amongst the rest the clambering Ivie grew
Knitting his wanton armes with grasping hold,
Least that the Poplar happely should rew
Her brother's strokes, whose boughs she doth enfold
With her lythe twigs till they the top survew,
And paint with pallid greene her buds of gold."

--- VIRGIL'S Gnat.

Chaucer describes it as--

"The erbe Ivie that groweth in our yard that mery is."

And in the same poem he prettily describes it as--

"The pallid Ivie building his own bowre."

As a wild plant, the Ivy is found in Europe, Asia, and Africa, but not in America, and wherever it is found it loves to cover old walls and buildings, and trees of every sort, with its close and rich drapery and clusters of black fruit,[132:1] and where it once establishes itself it is always beautiful, but not always harmless. Both on trees and buildings it requires very close watching. It will very soon destroy soft-wooded trees, such as the Poplar and the Ash, by its tight embrace, not by sucking out the sap, but by preventing the outward growth of the shoots, and checking--and at length preventing--the flow of sap; and in buildings it is no doubt beneficial as long as it is closely watched and kept in place, but if allowed to drive its roots into joints, or to grow under roofs, the swelling roots and branches will soon displace any masonry, and cause immense mischief.

We have only one species of Ivy in England, and there are only two real species recognized by present botanists, but there are infinite varieties, and many of them very beautiful. These variegated Ivies were known to the Greeks and Romans, and were highly prized by them, one especially with white fruit (at present not known) was the type of beauty. No higher praise could be given to a beauty than that she was "Hedera formosior alba." These varieties are scarcely mentioned by Gerard and Parkinson, and probably were not much valued; they are now in greater repute, and nothing will surpass them for rapidly and effectually covering any bare spaces.

I need scarcely add that the Ivy is so completely hardy that it will grow in any aspect and in any soil; that its flowers are the staple food of bees in the late autumn; and that all the varieties grow easily from cuttings at almost any time of the year.

FOOTNOTES:

[130:1] Sheep feeding on Ivy--

"My sheep have Honeysuckle bloom for pasture; Ivy grows
In multitudes around them, and blossoms like the Rose."

--- THEOCRITUS, Idyll v. (Calverley).
[132:1]

"The Ivy-mesh
Shading the Ethiop berries."--KEATS, Endymion.

 

KECKSIES.

Burgundy.

And nothing teems
But hateful Docks, rough Thistles, Kecksies, Burs,
Losing both beauty and utility.

--- Henry V, act v, sc. 2 (51).

Kecksies or Kecks are the dried and withered stems of the Hemlock, and the name is occasionally applied to the living plant. It seems also to have been used for any dry weeds--

"All the wyves of Tottenham came to se that syght,
With Wyspes, and Kexis, and ryschys ther lyght,
To fech hom ther husbandes, that wer tham trouth plyght."

--- "The Tournament of Tottenham," in
RITSON'S Ancient Songs and Ballads.

 

KNOT-GRASS.

Lysander.

Get you gone, you dwarf;
You minimus, of hindering Knot-grass made;
You bead, you Acorn.

---Midsummer Night's Dream, act iii, sc. 2 (328).

The Knot-grass is the Polygonum aviculare, a British weed, low, straggling, and many-jointed, hence its name of Knot-grass. There is no doubt that this is the plant meant, and its connection with a dwarf is explained by the belief, probably derived from some unrecorded character detected by the "doctrine of signatures," that the growth of children could be stopped by a diet of Knot-grass. Steevens quotes Beaumont and Fletcher to this effect, and this will probably explain the epithet "hindering." But there may be another explanation. Johnston tells us that in the north, "being difficult to cut in the harvest time, or to pull in the process of weeding, it has obtained the sobriquet of the Deil's-lingels." From this it may well be called "hindering," just as the Ononis, from the same habit of catching the plough and harrow, has obtained the prettier name of "Rest-harrow."

But though Shakespeare's Knot-grass is undoubtedly the Polygonum, yet the name was also given to another plant, for this cannot be the plant mentioned by Milton--

"The chewing flocks
Had ta'en their supper on the savoury herb
Of Knot-grass dew-besprent."--Comus.

In this case it must be one of the pasture Grasses, and may be Agrostis stolonifera, as it is said to be in Aubrey's "Natural History of Wilts" (Dr. Prior). _

Read next: Part 1. The Plant-Lore Of Shakespeare: Lady-Smocks, Lark's Heels, Laurel, Lavender

Read previous: Part 1. The Plant-Lore Of Shakespeare: Honeysuckle, Hyssop, Insane Root

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