The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare Part 48

Tell him I'll knock his Leek about his pate upon Saint Davy's Day.

_Henry V_, act iv, sc. 1 (54).

(3) _Fluellen._

If your majesties is remembered of it, the Welshmen did good service in a garden where Leeks did grow, wearing Leeks in their Monmouth caps; which your majesty knows to this hour is an honourable badge of the service; and I do believe your majesty takes no scorn to wear the Leek upon Saint Tavy's Day.

_Ibid._, act iv, sc. 7 (101).

(4)

In act v, sc. 1, is the encounter between Fluellen and Pistol, when he makes the bully eat the Leek; this causes such frequent mention of the Leek that it would be necessary to extract the whole scene, which, therefore, I will simply refer to in this way.

We can scarcely understand the very high value that was placed on Leeks in olden times. By the Egyptians the plant was almost considered sacred, "Porrum et caepe nefas violare et frangere morsu" (Juvenal); we know how Leeks were relished in Egypt by the Israelites; and among the Greeks they "appear to have const.i.tuted so important a part in ancient gardens, that the term p?as??, or a bed, derived its name from p?as??, the Greek word for Onion," or Leek[138:1] (Daubeny); while among the Anglo-Saxons it was very much the same. The name is pure Anglo-Saxon, and originally meant any vegetable; then it was restricted to any bulbous vegetable, before it was finally further restricted to our Leek; and "its importance was considered so much above that of any other vegetable, that _leac-tun_, the Leek-garden, became the common name of the kitchen garden, and _leac-ward_, the Leek-keeper, was used to designate the gardener" (Wright). The plant in those days gave its name to the Broad Leek which is our present Leek, the Yne Leek or Onion, the Garleek (Garlick), and others of the same tribe, while it was applied to other plants of very different families, as the Hollow Leek (_Corydalis cava_), and the House Leek (_Sempervivum tectorum_).

It seems to have been considered the hardiest of all flowers. In the account of the Great Frost of 1608, "this one infallible token" is given in proof of its severity. "The Leek whose courage hath ever been so undaunted that he hath borne up his l.u.s.ty head in all storms, and could never be compelled to shrink for hail, snow, frost, or showers, is now by the violence and cruelty of this weather beaten unto the earth, being rotted, dead, disgraced, and trod upon."

Its popularity still continues among the Welsh, by whom it is still, I believe, very largely cultivated; but it does not seem to have been much valued in England in Shakespeare's time, for Gerard has but little to say of its virtues, but much of its "hurts." "It hateth the body, ingendreth naughty blood, causeth troublesome and terrible dreames, offendeth the eyes, dulleth the sight, &c." Nor does Parkinson give a much more favourable account. "Our dainty eye now refuseth them wholly, in all sorts except the poorest; they are used with us sometimes in Lent to make pottage, and is a great and generall feeding in Wales with the vulgar gentlemen." It was even used as the proverbial expression of worthlessness, as in the "Roumaunt of the Rose," where the author says, speaking of "Phiciciens and Advocates"--

"For by her wille, without leese, Everi man shulde be seke, And though they die, they settle not a Leke."

And by Chaucer--

"And other suche, deare ynough a Leeke."

_Prologue of the Chanoune's Tale._

"The beste song that ever was made Ys not worth a Leky's blade, But men will tend ther tille."

_The Child of Bristowe._

FOOTNOTES:

[138:1] For a testimony of the high value placed on the Leek by the Greeks see a poem on ????, in "Anonymi Carmen de Herbis" in the "Poetae Bucolici et didactici."

LEMON.

_Biron._

A Lemon.

_Longaville._

Stuck with Cloves.

_Love's Labour's Lost_, act v, sc. 2 (654).

_See_ ORANGE AND CLOVES.

LETTUCE.

_Iago._

If we will plant Nettles or sow Lettuce. (_See_ HYSSOP.)

_Oth.e.l.lo_, act i, sc. 3 (324).

This excellent vegetable with its Latin name probably came to us from the Romans.

"Letuce of lac derivyed is perchaunce; For milk it hath or yeveth abundaunce."

_Palladius on Husbandrie_, ii, 216 (15th cent.) E. E. Text Soc.

It was cultivated by the Anglo-Saxons, who showed their knowledge of its narcotic qualities by giving it the name of Sleepwort; it is mentioned by Spenser as "cold Lettuce" ("Muiopotmos"). And in Shakespeare's time the sorts cultivated were very similar to, and probably as good as, ours.

LILY.

(1) _Iris._

Thy banks with Pioned and Lilied[140:1] brims.

_Tempest_, act iv, sc. 1 (64).

(2) _Launce._

Look you, she is as white as a Lily and as small as a wand.

_Two Gentlemen of Verona_, act ii, sc. 3 (22).

(3) _Julia._