________________________________________________
_ PART I. THE PLANT-LORE OF SHAKESPEARE ROSEMARY, RUE, RUSH, RYE
ROSEMARY.
(1) Perdita. Reverend Sirs,
For you there's Rosemary and Rue; these keep
Seeming and savour all the winter long;
Grace and remembrance be to you both.[256:1]
--- Winter's Tale, act iv, sc. 4 (73).
(2) Bawd.
Marry, come up, my dish of chastity with Rosemary and bays.
--- Pericles, act iv, sc. 6 (159).
(3) Edgar.
Bedlam beggars, who, with roaring voices
Strike in their numb'd and mortified bare arms
Pins, wooden pricks, and sprigs of Rosemary.
--- Lear, act ii, sc. 3 (14).
(4) Ophelia.
There's Rosemary, that's for remembrance; pray, love, remember.
--- Hamlet, act iv, sc. 5 (175).
(5) Nurse.
Doth not Rosemary and Romeo begin both with a letter?
Romeo.
Ay, nurse; what of that? both with an R.
Nurse.
Ah, mocker! that's the dog's name; R is for the ----.
No; I know it begins with some other
letter:--and she hath the prettiest sententious
of it, of you and Rosemary, that it would do you
good to hear it.
--- Romeo and Juliet, act ii, sc. 4 (219).
(6) Friar.
Dry up your tears, and stick your Rosemary
On this fair corse.
--- Ibid., act iv, sc. 5 (79).
The Rosemary is not a native of Britain, but of the sea-coast of the South of Europe, where it is very abundant. It was very early introduced into England, and is mentioned in an Anglo-Saxon Herbarium under its Latin name of Ros marinus, and is there translated by Bothen, i.e. Thyme; also in an Anglo-Saxon Vocabulary of the eleventh century, where it is translated Feld-madder and Sun-dew. In these places our present plant may or may not be meant, but there is no doubt that it is the one referred to in an ancient English poem of the fourteenth century, on the virtues of herbs, published in Wright and Halliwell's "Reliquiae Antiquae." The account of "The Gloriouse Rosemaryne" is long, but the beginning and ending are worth quoting--
"This herbe is callit Rosemaryn
Of vertu that is gode and fyne;
But alle the vertues tell I ne cane,
No I trawe no erthely man.
* * * * *
Of thys herbe telles Galiene
That in hys contree was a quene,
Gowtus and Crokyt as he hath tolde,
And eke sexty yere olde;
Sor and febyl, where men hyr sey
Scho semyth wel for to dey;
Of Rosmaryn scho toke sex po[=w]de,
And grownde hyt wel in a stownde,
And bathed hir threyes everi day,
Nine mowthes, as I herde say,
And afterwarde anoynitte wel hyr hede
With good bame as I rede;
Away fel alle that olde flessche,
And yo[=w]ge i-sprong tender and nessche;
So fresshe to be scho then began
Scho coveytede couplede be to man." (Vol. i, 196).
We can now scarcely understand the high favour in which Rosemary was formerly held; we are accustomed to see it neglected, or only tolerated in some corner of the kitchen garden, and not often tolerated there. But it was very different in Shakespeare's time, when it was in high favour for its evergreen leaves and fine aromatic scent, remaining a long time after picking, so long, indeed, that both leaves and scent were almost considered everlasting. This was its great charm, and so Spenser spoke of it as "the cheerful Rosemarie" and "refreshing Rosemarine," and good Sir Thomas More had a great affection for it. "As for Rosemarine," he said, "I lett it run alle over my garden walls, not onlie because my bees love it, but because tis the herb sacred to remembrance, and therefore to friendship; whence a sprig of it hath a dumb language that maketh it the chosen emblem at our funeral wakes and in our buriall grounds." And Parkinson gives a similar account of its popularity as a garden plant: "Being in every woman's garden, it were sufficient but to name it as an ornament among other sweet herbs and flowers in our gardens. In this our land, where it hath been planted in noblemen's and great men's gardens against brick walls, and there continued long, it riseth up in time unto a very great height, with a great and woody stem of that compasse that, being cloven out into boards, it hath served to make lutes or such like instruments, and here with us carpenters' rules and to divers others purposes." It was the favourite evergreen wherever the occasion required an emblem of constancy and perpetual remembrance, such especially as weddings and funerals, at both of which it was largely used; and so says Herrick of "The Rosemarie Branch"--
"Grow for two ends, it matters not at all,
Be't for my bridall or my buriall."
Its use at funerals was very widespread, for Laurembergius records a pretty custom in use in his day, 1631, at Frankfort: "Is mos apud nos retinetur, dum cupresso humile, vel rore marino, non solum coronamus funera jamjam ducenda, sed et iis appendimus ex iisdem herbis litteras collectas, significatrices nominis ejus quae defuncta est. Nam in puellarum funeribus haec fere fieri solent" ("Horticulturae," cap. vj.).
Its use at weddings is pleasantly told in the old ballad of "The Bride's Good-morrow"--
"The house is drest and garnisht for your sake
With flowers gallant and green;
A solemn feast your comely cooks do ready make,
Where all your friends will be seen:
Young men and maids do ready stand
With sweet Rosemary in their hand--
A perfect token of your virgin's life.
To wait upon you they intend
Unto the church to make an end:
And God make thee a joyfull wedded wife."
--- Roxburghe Ballads, vol. i.
It probably is one of the most lasting of evergreens after being gathered, though we can scarcely credit the statement recorded by Phillips that "it is the custom in France to put a branch of Rosemary in the hands of the dead when in the coffin, and we are told by Valmont Bomare, in his 'Histoire Naturelle,' that when the coffins have been opened after several years, the plant has been found to have vegetated so much that the leaves have covered the corpse." These were the general and popular uses of the Rosemary, but it was of high repute as a medicine, and still holds a place, though not so high as formerly, in the "Pharmacopoeia." "Rosemary," says Parkinson, "is almost of as great use as Bayes, both for inward and outward remedies, and as well for civill as physicall purposes--inwardly for the head and heart, outwardly for the sinews and joynts; for civile uses, as all do know, at weddings, funerals, &c., to bestow among friends; and the physicall are so many that you might as well be tyred in the reading as I in the writing, if I should set down all that might be said of it."
With this high character we may well leave this good, old-fashioned plant, merely noting that the name is popularly but erroneously supposed to mean the Rose of Mary. It has no connection with either Rose or Mary, but is the Ros marinus, or Ros Maris (as in Ovid--
"Ros maris, et laurus, nigraque myrtus olent;"
--- De Arte Aman., iii, 390),
the plant that delights in the sea-spray; and so the old spelling was Rosmarin. Gower says of the Star Alpheta--
"His herbe proper is Rosmarine;"
--- Conf. Aman., lib. sept.
a spelling which Shenstone adopted--
"And here trim Rosmarin that whilom crowned
The daintiest garden of the proudest peer."
It was also sometimes called Guardrobe, being "put into chests and presses among clothes, to preserve them from mothes and other vermine."
FOOTNOTES:
[256:1] Grace was symbolized by the Rue, or Herb of Grace, and remembrance by the Rosemary.
RUE.
(1) Perdita. For you there's Rosemary and Rue.
--- Winter's Tale, act iv, sc. 4 (74).
(See ROSEMARY, No. 1.)
(2) Gardener.
Here did she fall a tear; here in this place
I'll set a bank of Rue, sour Herb of Grace:
Rue, even for ruth, here shortly shall beseen,
In the remembrance of a weeping queen.
--- Richard II, act iii, sc. 4 (104).
(3) Antony.
Grace grow where these drops fall.
--- Antony and Cleopatra, act iv, sc. 2 (38).
(4) Ophelia.
There's Rue for you; and here's some for me: we may call it
Herb-grace o' Sundays: O, you must wear your Rue with a
difference.
--- Hamlet, act iv, sc. 5 (181).
(5) Clown.
Indeed, sir, she was the Sweet Marjoram of the salad, or
rather the Herb of Grace.
Lafeu.
They are not salad-herbs, you knave, they are nose-herbs.
--- All's Well that Ends Well, act iv, sc. 5 (17).
Comparing (2) and (3) together, there is little doubt that the same herb is alluded to in both; and it is, perhaps, alluded to, though not exactly named, in the following:
Friar Laurence.
In man, as well as herbs, grace and rude will.
--- Romeo and Juliet, act ii, sc. 3 (28).
Shakespeare thus gives us the two names for the same plant, Rue and Herb of Grace, and though at first sight there seems to be little or no connection between the two names, yet really they are so closely connected, that the one name was derived from, or rather suggested by, the other. Rue is the English form of the Greek and Latin ruta, a word which has never been explained, and in its earlier English form of rude came still nearer to the Latin original. But ruth was the English word for sorrow and remorse, and to rue was to be sorry for anything, or to have pity;[260:1] we still say a man will rue a particular action, i.e., be sorry for it; and so it was a natural thing to say that a plant which was so bitter, and had always borne the name Rue or Ruth, must be connected with repentance. It was, therefore, the Herb of Repentance, and this was soon transformed into the Herb of Grace (in 1838 Loudon said, "It is to this day called Ave Grace in Sussex"), repentance being the chief sign of grace; and it is not unlikely that this idea was strengthened by the connection of Rue with the bitter herbs of the Bible, though it is only once mentioned, and then with no special remark, except as a tithable garden herb, together with Anise and Cummin.
The Rue, like Lavender and Rosemary, is a native of the more barren parts of the coasts of the Mediterranean, and has been found on Mount Tabor, but it was one of the earliest occupants of the English Herb garden. It is very frequently mentioned in the Saxon Leech Books, and entered so largely into their prescriptions that it must have been very extensively grown. Its strong aromatic smell,[261:1] and bitter taste, with the blistering quality of the leaves, soon established its character as almost a heal-all.
"Rew bitter a worthy gres (herb)
Mekyl of myth and vertu is."
--- Stockholm MS., 1305.
Even beasts were supposed to have discovered its virtues, so that weasels were gravely said, and this by such men as Pliny, to eat Rue when they were preparing themselves for a fight with rats and serpents. Its especial virtue was an eye-salve, a use which Milton did not overlook--
"To nobler sights
Michael from Adam's eyes the filme removed
Which that false fruit which promised clearer sight
Had bred; then purged with Euphrasie and Rue
The visual nerve, for he had much to see:"
--- Paradise Lost, book xi.;
and which was more fully stated in the old lines of the Schola Salerni--
"Nobilis est Ruta quia lumina reddit acuta;
Auxilio rutae, vir lippe, videbis acute;
Cruda comesta recens oculos Caligine purgat;
Ruta facit castum, dat lumen, et ingerit astum;
Cocta facit Ruta et de pollicibus loca tuta."
After reading this high moral and physical character of the herb, it is rather startling to find that "It is believed that if stolen from a neighbour's garden it would prosper better." It was, however, an old belief--
"They sayen eke stolen sede is butt the bette."
--- Palladius on Husbandrie (c. 1420) iv, 269.
"It is a common received opinion that Rue will grow the better if it bee filtched out of another man's garden."--HOLLAND'S Pliny, xix. 7.
As other medicines were introduced the Rue declined in favour, so that Parkinson spoke of it with qualified praise--"Without doubt it is a most wholesom herb, although bitter and strong. Some do rip up a bead-rowl of the virtues of Rue, . . . but beware of the too-frequent or overmuch use therof." And Dr. Daubeny says of it, "It is a powerful stimulant and narcotic, but not much used in modern practise."
As a garden plant, the Rue forms a pretty shrub for a rock-work, if somewhat attended to, so as to prevent its becoming straggling and untidy. The delicate green and peculiar shape of the leaves give it a distinctive character, which forms a good contrast to other plants.
FOOTNOTES:
[260:1]
"Rewe on my child, that of thyn gentilnesse
Rewest on every sinful in destresse."
--- CHAUCER, The Man of Lawes Tale.
[261:1] "Ranke-smelling Rue."--SPENSER, Muiopotmos.
RUSH.
(1) Rosalind. He taught me how to know a man in love; in which cage of
Rushes I am sure you are not prisoner.
--- As You Like It, act iii, sc. 2 (388).
(2) Phoebe.
Lean but on a Rush,
The cicatrice and capable impressure
Thy palm some moment keeps.
--- Ibid., act iii, sc. 5 (22).
(3) Clown.
As fit as Tib's Rush for Tom's forefinger.
--- All's Well that Ends Well, act ii, sc. 2 (24).
(4) Romeo.
Let wantons light of heart
Tickle the senseless Rushes with their heels.
--- Romeo and Juliet, act i, sc. 4 (35).
(5) Dromio of Syracuse.
Some devils ask but the parings of one's nail,
A Rush, a hair, a drop of blood, a pin,
A Nut, a Cherry-stone.
--- Comedy of Errors, act iv, sc. 3 (72).
(6) Bastard.
A Rush will be a beam
To hang thee on.
--- King John, act iv, sc. 3 (129).
(7) 1st Groom.
More Rushes, more Rushes.
--- 2nd Henry IV, act v, sc. 5 (1).
(8) Eros.
He's walking in the garden--thus; and spurns
The Rush that lies before him.
--- Antony and Cleopatra, act iii, sc. 5 (17).
(9) Othello.
Man but a Rush against Othello's breast,
And he retires.
--- Othello, act v, sc. 2 (270).
(10) Grumio.
Is supper ready, the house trimmed, Rushes strewed, cobwebs
swept?
--- Taming of the Shrew, act iv, sc. 1 (47).
(11) Katherine.
Be it moon or sun, or what you please,
And if you please to call it a Rush-candle,
Henceforth I vow it shall be so for me.
--- Ibid., act iv, sc. 5 (13).
(12) Glendower.
She bids you on the wanton Rushes lay you down,
And rest your gentle head upon her lap.
--- 1st Henry IV, act iii, sc. 1 (214).
(13) Marcius.
He that depends
Upon your favours swims with fins of lead
And hews down Oaks with Rushes.
--- Coriolanus, act i, sc. 1 (183).
(14) Iachimo.
Our Tarquin thus
Did softly press the Rushes.
--- Cymbeline, act ii, sc. 2 (12).
(15) Senator.
Our gates
Which yet seem shut, we have but pinn'd with Rushes!
They'll open of themselves.
--- Coriolanus, act i, sc. 4 (16).
(16)
And being lighted, by the light he spies
Lucretia's glove, wherein her needle sticks;
He takes it from the Rushes where it lies.
--- Lucrece (316).
(17) See REEDS, No. 7.
(18) Wooer.
Rings she made
Of Rushes that grew by, and to 'em spoke
The prettiest posies.
---Two Noble Kinsmen, act iv, sc. 1 (109).
See also FLAG, REED, and BULRUSH.
Like the Reed, the Rush often stands for any water-loving, grassy plant, and, like the Reed, it was the emblem of yielding weakness and of uselessness.[264:1] The three principal Rushes referred to by Shakespeare are the Common Rush (Juncus communis), the Bulrush (Scirpus lacustris), and the Sweet Rush (Acorus calamus).
The Common Rush, though the mark of badly cultivated ground, and the emblem of uselessness, was not without its uses, some of which are referred to in Nos. 1, 3, and 11. In Nos. 3 and 18 reference is made to the Rush-ring, a ring, no doubt, originally meant and used for the purposes of honest betrothal, but afterwards so vilely used for the purposes of mock marriages, that even as early as 1217 Richard Bishop of Salisbury had to issue his edict against the use of "annulum de junco."
The Rush betrothal ring is mentioned by Spenser--
"O thou great shepheard, Lobbin, how great is thy griefe!
Where bene the nosegayes that she dight for thee?
The coloured chaplets wrought with a chiefe,
The knotted Rush-ringes and gilt Rosemarie."
--- Shepherd's Calendar--November.
And by Quarles--
"Love-sick swains
Compose Rush-rings, and Myrtle-berry chains,
And stuck with glorious King-cups in their bonnets,
Adorned with Laurel slip, chant true love sonnets."
But the uses of the Rush were not all bad. Newton, in 1587, said of the Rush--"It is a round smooth shoote without joints or knots, having within it a white substance or pith, which being drawn forth showeth like long white, soft, gentle, and round thread, and serveth for many purposes. Heerewith be made manie pretie imagined devises for Bride-ales and other solemnities, as little baskets, hampers, frames, pitchers, dishes, combs, brushes, stooles, chaires, purses with strings, girdles, and manie such other pretie and curious and artificiall conceits, which at such times many do take the paines to make and hang up in their houses, as tokens of good will to the new married Bride; and after the solemnities ended, to bestow abroad for Bride-gifts or presents." It was this "white substance or pith" from which the Rush candle (No. 11) was and still is made: a candle which in early days was probably the universal candle, which, till within a few years, was the night candle of every sick chamber, in which most of us can recollect it as a most ghastly object as it used to stand, "stationed in a basin on the floor, where it glimmered away like a gigantic lighthouse in a particularly small piece of water" (Pickwick), till expelled by the night-lights, and which is still made by Welsh labourers, and, I suppose, in Shakespeare's time was the only candle used by the poor.
"If your influence be quite damm'd up
With black usurping mists, some gentle taper,
Though a Rush-candle from the wicker hole
Of some clay habitation, visit us
With thy long levell'd rule of streaming light."--Comus.
But the chief use of Rushes in those days was to strew the floors of houses and churches (Nos. 4, 7, 10, 12, and 14). This custom seems to have been universal in all houses of any pretence. "William the son of William of Alesbury holds three roods of land of the Lord the King in Alesbury in Com. Buck by the service of finding straw for the bed of the Lord the King, and to strew his chamber, and also of finding for the King when he comes to Alesbury straw for his bed, and besides this Grass or Rushes to make his chamber pleasant."--BLUNT'S Tenures. The custom went on even to our own day in Norwich Cathedral, and the "picturesque custom still lingers in the West of strewing the floors of the churches on Whit Sunday with Rushes freshly pulled from the meadows. This custom attains its highest perfection in the church of St. Mary Redcliffe at Bristol. On 'Rush Sunday' the floor is strewn with Rushes. All the merchants throw open their conservatories for the vicar to take his choice of their flowers, and the pulpit, the lectern, the choir, and the communion rails and table present a scene of great beauty."--The Garden, May, 1877.
For this purpose the Sweet-scented Rush was always used where it could be procured, and when first laid down it must have made a pleasant carpet; but it was a sadly dirty arrangement, and gives us a very poor idea of the cleanliness of even the best houses, though it probably was not the custom all through the year, as Newton says, speaking of Sedges, but evidently confusing the Sedge with the Sweet-scented Rush, "with the which many in this countrie do use in sommer time to straw their parlours and churches, as well for cooleness as for pleasant smell."[266:1] This Rush (Acorus calamus) is a British plant, with broad leaves, which have a strong cinnamon-like smell, which obtained for the plant the old Saxon name of Beewort. Another (so-called) Rush, the Flowering Rush (Butomus umbellatus), is one of the very handsomest of the British plants, bearing on a long straight stem a large umbel of very handsome pink flowers. Wherever there is a pond in a garden, these fine Rushes should have a place, though they may be grown in the open border where the ground is not too dry.
There is a story told by Sir John Mandeville in connection with Rushes which is not easy to understand. According to his account, our Saviour's crown of thorns was made of Rushes! "And zif alle it be so that men seyn that this Croune is of Thornes, zee shall undirstande that it was of Jonkes of the See, that is to sey, Russhes of the See, that prykken als scharpely as Thornes. For I have seen and beholden many times that of Parys and that of Constantynoble, for thei were bothe on, made of Russches of the See. But men have departed hem in two parties, of the which on part is at Parys, and the other part is at Constantynoble--and I have on of the precyouse Thornes, that semethe licke a white Thorn, and that was zoven to me for great specyaltee. . . . The Jewes setten him in a chayere and clad him in a mantelle, and then made thei the Croune of Jonkes of the See."--Voiage and Travaile, c. 2.
I have no certainty to what Rush the pleasant old traveller can here refer. I can only guess that as Rushes and Sedges were almost interchangeable names, he may have meant the Sea Holly, formerly called the Holly-sedge, of which there is a very appropriate account given in an old Saxon runelay thus translated by Cockayne: "Hollysedge hath its dwelling oftenest in a marsh, it waxeth in water, woundeth fearfully, burneth with blood (i.e., draws blood and pains) every one of men who to it offers any handling."[267:1]
FOOTNOTES:
[264:1]
"Around the islet at its lowest edge,
Lo, there beneath, where breaks th' encircling wave,
The yielding mud is thick with Rushes crowned.
No other flower with frond or leafy growth
Or hardened fibre there can life sustain,
For none bend safely to the watery shock."
--- DANTE, Purgatorio, canto i. (Johnston).
[266:1] "In the South of Europe Juniper branches were used for this purpose, as they still are in Sweden."--Flora Domestica, p. 213.
"As I have seen upon a bridal day,
Full many maids clad in their best array,
In honour of the bride, come with their flaskets
Filled full of flowers, other in wicker baskets
Bring from the Marish Rushes, to overspread
The ground whereon to Church the lovers tread."
--- BROWNE'S Brit. Past., i, 2.
[267:1] I leave this as I first wrote it, but I have to thank Mr. Britten for the very probable suggestion that Sir John Mandeville was right. Not only does the Juncus acutus "prykken als scharpely as Thornes," but "what is shown in Paris at the present day as the crown of Thorns is certainly, as Sir John says, made of rushes; the curious may consult M. Rohault de Fleury's sumptuous 'Memoire sur les Instruments de la Passion,' for a full description of it."
RYE.
(1) Iris. Ceres, most bounteous lady, thy rich leas
Of Wheat, Rye, Barley, Vetches, Oats, and Pease.
--- Tempest, act iv, sc. 1 (60).
(2) Iris.
You sunburnt sicklemen, of August weary,
Come hither from the furrow and be merry;
Make holiday; your Rye-straw hats put on.
--- Ibid., act iv, sc. 1 (135).
(3) Song.
Between the acres of the Rye
These pretty country folks would lye.
--- As You Like It, act v, sc. 3 (23).
The Rye of Shakespeare's time was identical with our own (Secale cereale). It is not a British plant, and its native country is not exactly known; but it seems probable that both the plant and the name came from the region of the Caucasus.
As a food-plant Rye was not in good repute in Shakespeare's time. Gerard said of it, "It is harder to digest than Wheat, yet to rusticke bodies that can well digest it, it yields good nourishment." But "recent investigations by Professor Wanklyn and Mr. Cooper appear to give the first place to Rye as the most nutritious of all our cereals. Rye contains more gluten, and is pronounced by them one-third richer than Wheat. Rye, moreover, is capable of thriving in almost any soil."--Gardener's Chronicle, 1877. _
Read next: Part 1. The Plant-Lore Of Shakespeare: Saffron, Samphire, Savory
Read previous: Part 1. The Plant-Lore Of Shakespeare: Rice, Roses
Table of content of Plant-Lore & Garden-Craft of Shakespeare
GO TO TOP OF SCREEN
Post your review
Your review will be placed after the table of content of this book
