describe this potato (Sisarum peruvianum) as having the same property. Holinshed, in his description of England, says, 'of the potato and such venerous roots, I speak not.'

In Troilus and Cressida, Act v. Scene 2, Luxury is represented as having a potato finger which tickles ; here the same property is referred to.

The Skyrret is the plant alluded to by Falstaff under the name potato. It belongs to the order Umbelliferæ, and is a very different plant to the common potato (Solanum tuberosum).

Eringoes. The Eringo, or sea-holly, sea-hulver, sea-holme (Eryngium maritimum), is a stout prickly plant, very rigid and glaucous, found on sandy sea-shores; the flowers are of amethyst blue, grow in dense heads, and appear in July, August, and September. The roots are large and fleshy, and extend many feet into the sand.

In Shakspere's time the roots were candied and eaten as a sweetmeat, being considered stimulating and restorative. Dr. William Turner gives a particular account of its properties and uses, which are such as Falstaff, in his amorous adventures, would desire, and adds :- Some in our days condite or keep in sugar the roots of this plant for the same purpose.' Gerarde, after describing the plant, says:

The roots, condited or preserved in sugar, are exceedingly good to be given to old and aged persons

that are consumed and withered with age, and which want natural moisture. They restore the aged, and amend the defects of nature in the young.'

Eringoes are noticed in The Fawne,' by John Marston. And 'And yet I hear, Sir Amorous, you cherish your loynes with high art, the only engrosser of eringoes, prepared cantharides, cullesses made of dissolved pearle, and brus'd amber,' &c.

Drayton, in the first song of 'Polyolbion,' has:—

Besides the Sea-holme here, that spreadeth all our shore,
The sick consuming man so powerful to restore,
Whose root the eryngo is.

Richard Carew, in his 'Survey of Cornwall,' speaking of herbs and roots for the pot and medicine, notices sea-holme. "The sea-holme root preserveth either in sirrup or by candying, and is accepted for a great restorative.'

In the same Scene, Pistol addresses the fairies :

Elves, list your names; silence, you airy toys!
Cricket, to Windsor-chimneys shalt thou leap :
Where fires thou find'st unraked, and hearths unswept,
There pinch the maids as blue as bilberry :
Our radiant queen hates sluts, and sluttery.

Bilberry (Vaccinum Myrtillus), called also whortleberry, grows in woods and on heaths; the plant is about twelve inches high, flowers in May, and bears a small bluish black fruit of agreeable taste. The colour of the fruit is similar to a bruise

produced by a pinch. Gerarde says it is called black whortle or hurtle worts, or whortleberry, bilberry, and in some places whinberry; also that they grow in a wood by Highgate, called Finchley Wood, and the berries do colour the mouths and lips of those that eat them with a black colour.'

CHAPTER IV.

MEASURE FOR MEASURE.*

HE plants named in this play are Birch (Betula alba), Medlar (Mespilus germanica), Burr (Arctium Lappa).

In Act i. Scene 4, the Duke, addressing Friar Thomas, says:—

We have strict statutes, and most biting laws,
(The needful bits and curbs for headstrong steeds)
Which for these fourteen years we have let slip;
Even like an o'ergrown lion in a cave,

That goes not out to prey: now, as fond fathers,
Having bound up the threat'ning twigs of birch,
Only to stick it in their children's sight,

For terror, not to use, in time the rod

Becomes more mocked than feared; so our decrees,

Dead to infliction, to themselves are dead,

And liberty plucks justice by the nose;

The baby beats the nurse, and quite athwart

Goes all decorum.

Birch (Betula alba, common Birch). This wellknown tree grows commonly in dry soils and

* First printed in the folio of 1623.

hilly countries, and is cultivated here often as an ornamental tree. The wood is tough, and the branches are used for many purposes, but Shakspere alludes to them only as rods for correction. It appears to have been in use early as an instrument of castigation. In A Caveat or Warning for Common Cursetors, vulgarly called Vagabonds, set forth by Thomas Harman, Esq.' (printed in 1566), it is represented in a wood-cut with the following lines:Three things to be noted all in their kind :

A staff, a besom, a With that will wind;

A besom of byrche for babes very feete,

A long lasting lybbet for loubbes as meet;
A wyth so wynde up that these will not keep,
Bind all up in one and use it to sweep.

In another part of the work it is represented as made entirely of the birch twigs, tied at the end and in the middle, under which are the following lines:A whyp is a whysker that will wrest out blood,

Of back and of body beaten right well;

Of all the other it doth the most good,

Experience teacheth, and they can well tell.

Gerarde, speaking of the nature and virtue of the birch, refers to Pliny, and < says, In times past the magistrates' rods were made thereof, and in our time also schoolmasters and parents do terrifie their children with rods made of birch.'*

* There is another production of the vegetable kingdom which Shakspere notices as being used for correction of offenders; that is,