Proserpina Volume II Part 10

In re-reading the text of this number I can secure my young readers of some things left doubtful, as, for instance, in their acceptance of the word 'Monacha,' for the flower described in the sixth chapter. I have used it now habitually too long to part with it myself, and I think it will be found serviceable and pleasurable by others. Neither shall I now change the position of the Draconidae, as suggested at p. 118, but keep all as first planned. See among other reasons for doing so the letter quoted in p. 121.

I also add to the plate originally prepared for this number, one showing the effect of Veronica officinalis in decoration of foreground, merely by its green leaves; see the paragraphs 1 and 5 of Chapter VI. I have not represented the fine serration of the leaves, as they are quite invisible from standing height: the book should be laid on the floor and looked down on, without stooping, to see the effect intended. And so I gladly close this long-lagging number, hoping never to write such a tiresome chapter as this again, or to make so long a pause between any readable one and its sequence.

NOTES

[1] Vol. i., p. 212, note.

[2] See 'Deucalion,' vol. ii., chap, i., p. 12, -- 18.

[3] I am ashamed to give so rude outlines; but every moment now is valuable to me: careful outline of a dog-violet is given in Plate X.

[4] A careless bit of Byron's, (the last song but one in the 'Deformed Transformed'); but Byron's most careless work is better, by its innate energy, than other people's most laboured. I suppress, in some doubts about my 'digamma,' notes on the Greek violet and the Ion of Euripides;--which the reader will perhaps be good enough to fancy a serious loss to him, and supply for himself.

[5] Nine; I see that I missed count of P. farinosa, the most abundant of all.

[6] "A feeble little quatrefoil--growing one on the stem, like a Parna.s.sia, and looking like a Parna.s.sia that had dropped a leaf. I think it drops one of its own four, mostly, and lives as three-fourths of itself, for most of its time. Stamens pale gold. Root-leaves, three or four, gra.s.s-like; growing among the moist moss chiefly."

[7] The great work of Lecoq, 'Geographic Botanique,' is of priceless value; but treats all on too vast a scale for our purposes.

[8] It is, I believe, Sowerby's Viola Lutea, 721 of the old edition, there painted with purple upper petals; but he says in the text, "Petals either all yellow, or the two uppermost are of a blue purple, the rest yellow with a blue tinge: very often the whole are purple."

[9] Did the wretch never hear bees in a lime tree then, or ever see one on a star gentian?

[10] Septuagint, "the eyes of doves out of thy silence." Vulgate, "the eyes of doves, besides that which is hidden in them." Meaning--the _dim_ look of love, beyond all others in sweetness.

[11] When I have the chance, and the time, to submit the proofs of 'Proserpina' to friends who know more of Botany than I, or have kindness enough to ascertain debateable things for me, I mean in future to do so,--using the letter A to signify Amicus, generally; with acknowledgment by name, when it is permitted, of especial help or correction. Note first of this kind: I find here on this word, 'five-petaled,' as applied to Pinguicula, "Qy. two-lipped? it is monopetalous, and monosepalous, the calyx and corolla being each all in one piece."

Yes; and I am glad to have the observation inserted. But my term, 'five-petaled,' must stand. For the question with me is always first, not how the petals are connected, but how many they are. Also I have accepted the term petal--but never the word lip--as applied to flowers. The generic term 'l.a.b.i.atae' is cancelled in 'Proserpina,' 'Vestales' being subst.i.tuted; and these flowers, when I come to examine them, are to be described, not as divided into two lips, but into hood, ap.r.o.n, and side-pockets. Farther, the depth to which either calyx or corolla is divided, and the firmness with which the petals are attached to the torus, may, indeed, often be an important part of the plant's description, but ought not to be elements in its definition. Three petaled and three-sepaled, four-petaled and four-sepaled, five-petaled and five-sepaled, etc., etc., are essential--with me, primal--elements of definition; next, whether resolute or stellar in their connection; next, whether round or pointed, etc. Fancy, for instance, the fatality to a rose of pointing its petals, and to a lily, of rounding them! But how deep cut, or how hard holding, is quite a minor question.

Farther, that all plants _are_ petaled and sepaled, and never mere cups in saucers, is a great fact, not to be dwelt on in a note.

[12] Our 'Lucia Nivea,' 'Blanche Lucy;' in present botany, Bog bean! having no connection whatever with any manner of bean, but only a slight resemblance to bean-_leaves_ in its own lower ones. Compare Ch. IV. -- 11.

[13] It is not. (Resolute negative from A., unsparing of time for me; and what a state of things it all signifies!)

[14] With the following three notes, 'A' must become a definitely and gratefully interpreted letter. I am indebted for the first, conclusive in itself, but variously supported and confirmed by the two following, to R.J.

Mann, Esq., M.D., long ago a pupil of Dr. Lindley's, and now on the council of Whitelands College, Chelsea:--for the second, to Mr. Thomas Moore, F.L.S., the kind Keeper of the Botanic Garden at Chelsea; for the third, which will be farther on useful to us, to Miss Kemm, the botanical lecturer at Whitelands.

(1) There is no explanation of Lentibulariaceae in Lindley's 'Vegetable Kingdom.' He was not great in that line. The term is, however, taken from _Lenticula_, the lentil, in allusion to the lentil-shaped air-bladders of the typical genus _Utricularia_.

The change of the c into b may possibly have been made only from some euphonic fancy of the contriver of the name, who, I think, was Rich.

But I somewhat incline myself to think that the _tibia_, a pipe or flute, may have had something to do with it. The _tibia_ may possibly have been diminished into a little pipe by a stretch of licence, and have become _tibula_: [but _tibulus_ is a kind of pine tree in Pliny]; when _Len tibula_ would be the lens or lentil-shaped pipe or bladder. I give you this only for what it is worth. The _lenticula_, as a derivation, is reliable and has authority.

_Lenticula_, a lentil, a freckly eruption; _lenticularis_, lentil-shaped; so the nat. ord. ought to be (if this be right) _lenticulariaceae_.

(2) BOTANIC GARDENS, CHELSEA, _Feb._ 14, 1882.

_Lentibularia_ is an old generic name of Tournefort's, which has been superseded by _utricularia,_ but, oddly enough, has been retained in the name of the order _lentibulareae_; but it probably comes from _lenticula_, which signifies the little root bladders, somewhat resembling lentils.

(3) 'Manual of Scientific Terms,' Stormonth, p. 234.

_Lentibulariaceae_, neuter, plural.

(_Lenticula_, the shape of a lentil; from _lens_, a lentil.) The b.u.t.terwort family, an order of plants so named from the lenticular shape of the air-bladders on the branches of utricularia, one of the genera. (But observe that the _b.u.t.terworts_ have nothing of the sort, any of them.--R.)

Loudon.--"Floaters."

Lindley.--"Sometimes with whorled vesicles."

In Nuttall's Standard (?) p.r.o.nouncing Dictionary, it is given,-- _Lenticulareae_, a nat. ord. of marsh plants, which thrive in water or marshes.

[15] More accurately, shows the pruned roots of branches,--[Greek: epeide prota tomen en h.o.r.essi lelotpen]. The _pruning_ is the mythic expression of the subduing of pa.s.sion by rectorial law.

[16] The bitter sorrow with which I first recognized the extreme rarity of finely-developed organic sight is expressed enough in the lecture on the Mystery of Life, added in the large edition of 'Sesame and Lilies.'

[17] Lat. acesco, to turn sour.

[18] Withering quotes this as from Linnaeus, and adds on authority of a Mr.

Hawkes, "This did not succeed when tried with cows' milk." He also gives as another name, Yorks.h.i.+re Sanicle; and says it is called _earning gra.s.s_ in Scotland. Linnaeus says the juice will curdle reindeer's milk. The name for rennet is _earning_, in Lincolns.h.i.+re. Withering also gives this note: "_Pinguis_, fat, from its effect in CONGEALING milk."--(A.) Withering of course wrong: the name comes, be the reader finally a.s.sured, from the fatness of the green leaf, quite peculiar among wild plants, and fastened down for us in the French word 'Gra.s.sette.' I have found the flowers also difficult to dry, in the benighted early times when I used to think a dried plant useful! See closing paragraphs of the *4th chapter.--R.

[19] I find much more difficulty, myself, being old, in using my altered names for species than my young scholars will. In watching the bells of the purple bindweed fade at evening, let them learn the fourth verse of the prayer of Hezekiah, as it is in the Vulgate--"Generatio mea ablata est, et convoluta est a me, sicut tabernaculum pastoris,"--and they will not forget the name of the fast-fading--ever renewed--"belle d'un jour."

[20] "It is Miss Cobbe, I think, who says 'all wild flowers know how to die gracefully.'"--A.

[21] See distinction between rec.u.mbent and rampant herbs, below, under 'Veronica Agrestis,' p. 72.

[22] 'Abstracted' rather, I should have said, and with perfect skill, by Mr. Collingwood (the joint translator of Xenophon's Economics for the 'Bibliotheca Pastorum'). So also the next following cut, Fig. 5.

[23] Of the references, henceforward necessary to the books I have used as authorities, the reader will please note the following abbreviations:--

C. Curtis's Magazine of Botany.

D. Flora Danica.

F. Figuier.

G. Sibthorpe's Flora Graeca.

L. Linnaeus. Systema Naturae.

L.S. Linnaeus's Flora Suecica. But till we are quite used to the other letters, I print this reference in words.

L.N. William Curtis's Flora Londinensis. Of the exquisite plates engraved for this book by James Sowerby, note is taken in the close of next chapter.

O. Sowerby's English Wild Flowers; the old edition in thirty-two thin volumes--far the best.

S. Sowerby's English Wild Flowers; the modern edition in ten volumes.

[24] See letter on the last results of our African campaigns, in the _Morning Post_ of April 14th, of this year.

[25] I deliberately, not garrulously, allow more autobiography in 'Proserpina' than is becoming, because I know not how far I may be permitted to carry on that which was begun in 'Fors.'

[26] In present Botany, Polygala Chamaebuxus; C. 316: or, in English, Much Milk Ground-box. It is not, as matters usually go, a name to be ill thought of, as it really contains three ideas; and the plant does, without doubt, somewhat resemble box, and grows on the ground;--far more fitly called 'ground-box' than the Veronica 'ground-oak.' I want to find a pretty name for it in connection with Savoy or Dauphine, where it indicates, as above stated, the _healthy_ districts of _hard_ limestone. I do not remember it as ever occurring among the dark and moist shales of the inner mountain ranges, which at once confine and pollute the air.

[27] Which, with the following page, is the summary of many chapters of 'Modern Painters:' and of the aims kept in view throughout 'Munera Pulveris.' The three kinds of Desert specified--of Reed, Sand, and Rock--should be kept in mind as exhaustively including the states of the earth neglected by man. For instance of a Reed desert, produced _merely_ by his neglect, see Sir Samuel Baker's account of the choking up of the bed of the White Nile. Of the sand desert, Sir F. Palgrave's journey from the Djowf to Hayel, vol. i., p. 92.