The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare
How now, my Nettle of India?
_Twelfth Night_, act ii, sc. 5 (17).[176:1]
(6) _King Richard._
Yield stinging Nettles to my enemies.
_Richard II_, act iii, sc. 2 (18).
(7) _Hotspur._
I tell you, my lord fool, out of this Nettle, danger, we pluck
this flower, safety.
_1st Henry IV_, act ii, sc. 3 (8).
(8) _Ely._
The Strawberry grows underneath the Nettle.
_Henry V_, act i, sc. 1 (60).
(9) _Cressida._
I'll spring up in his tears, an 'twere a Nettle against May.
_Troilus and Cressida_, act i, sc. 2 (190).
(10) _Menenius._
We call a Nettle but a Nettle, and
The fault of fools but folly.
_Coriolanus_, act ii, sc. 1 (207).
(11) _Laertes._
Goads, Thorns, Nettles, tails of wasps.
_Winter's Tale_, act i, sc. 2 (329).
(12) _Iago._
If we will plant Nettles or sow Lettuce.
_Othello_, act i, sc. 3 (324).
(_See_ HYSSOP.)
(13) _Palamon._
Who do bear thy yoke
As 'twer a wreath of roses, yet is heavier
Than lead itselfe, stings more than Nettles.
_Two Noble Kinsmen_, act v, sc. 1 (101).
The Nettle needs no introduction; we are all too well acquainted with
it, yet it is not altogether a weed to be despised. We have two native
species (Urtica urens and U. dioica) with sufficiently strong qualities,
but we have a third (U. pilulifera) very curious in its manner of
bearing its female flowers in clusters of compact little balls, which is
far more virulent than either of our native species, and is said by
Camden to have been introduced by the Romans to chafe their bodies when
frozen by the cold of Britain. The story is probably quite apocryphal,
but the plant is an alien, and only grows in a few places.
Both the Latin and English names of the plant record its qualities.
Urtica is from _uro_, to burn; and Nettle is (etymologically) the same
word as needle, and the plant is so named, not for its stinging
qualities, but because at one time the Nettle supplied the chief
instrument of sewing; not the instrument which holds the thread, and to
which we now confine the word needle, but the thread itself, and very
good thread it made. The poet Campbell says in one of his letters--"I
have slept in Nettle sheets, and dined off a Nettle table-cloth, and I
have heard my mother say that she thought Nettle cloth more durable than
any other linen." It has also been used for making paper, and for both
these purposes, as well as for rope-making, the Rhea fibre of the
Himalaya, which is simply a gigantic Nettle (_Urtica_ or _Böhmeria
nivea_), is very largely cultivated. Nor is the Nettle to be despised as
an article of food.[177:1] In many parts of England the young shoots are
boiled and much relished. In 1596 Coghan wrote of it: "I will speak
somewhat of the Nettle that Gardeners may understand what wrong they do
in plucking it for the weede, seeing it is so profitable to many
purposes. . . . Cunning cookes at the spring of the yeare, when Nettles
first bud forth, can make good pottage with them, especially with red
Nettles" ("Haven of Health," p. 86). In February, 1661, Pepys made the
entry in his diary--"We did eat some Nettle porridge, which was made on
purpose to-day for some of their coming, and was very good." Andrew
Fairservice said of himself--"Nae doubt I should understand my trade of
horticulture, seeing I was bred in the Parish of Dreepdaily, where they
raise lang Kale under glass, and force the early Nettles for their
spring Kale" ("Rob Roy," c. 7). Gipsies are said to cook it as an
excellent vegetable, and M. Soyer tried hard, but almost in vain, to
recommend it as a most dainty dish. Having so many uses, we are not
surprised to find that it has at times been regularly cultivated as a
garden crop, so that I have somewhere seen an account of tithe of
Nettles being taken; and in the old churchwardens' account of St.
Michael's, Bath, is the entry in the year 1400, "Pro Urticis venditis ad
Lawrencium Bebbe, 2d."
Nettles are much used in the neighbourhood of London to pack plums and
other fruit with bloom on them, so that in some market gardens they are
not only not destroyed, but encouraged, and even cultivated. And this
is an old practice; Lawson's advice in 1683 was--"For the gathering of
all other stone-fruit, as Nectarines, Apricots, Peaches, Pear-plums,
Damsons, Bullas, and such like, . . . in the bottom of your large sives
where you put them, you shall lay Nettles, and likewise in the top, for
that will ripen those that are most unready" ("New Orchard," p. 96).
The "Nettle of India" (No. 5) has puzzled the commentators. It is
probably not the true reading; if the true reading, it may only mean a
Nettle of extra-stinging quality; but it may also mean an Eastern plant
that was used to produce cowage, or cow-itch. "The hairs of the pods of
Mucuna pruriens, &c., constitute the substance called cow-itch, a
mechanical Anthelmintic."--LINDLEY. This plant is said to have been
called the Nettle of India, but I do not find it so named in
Shakespeare's time.
In other points the Nettle is a most interesting plant. Microscopists
find in it most beautiful objects for the microscope; entomologists
value it, for it is such a favourite of butterflies and other insects,
that in Britain alone upwards of thirty insects feed solely on the
Nettle plant, and it is one of those curious plants which mark the
progress of civilization by following man wherever he goes.[178:1]
But as a garden plant the only advice to be given is to keep it out of
the garden by every means. In good cultivated ground it becomes a sad
weed if once allowed a settlement. The Himalayan Böhmerias, however, are
handsome, but only for their foliage; and though we cannot, perhaps,
admit our roadside Dead Nettles, which however are much handsomer than
many foreign flowers which we carefully tend and prize, yet the Austrian
Dead Nettle (_Lamium orvala_, "Bot. Mag.," v. 172) may be well admitted
as a handsome garden plant.
FOOTNOTES:
[176:1] This a modern reading; the correct reading is "metal."
[177:1]
"Si forte in medio positorum abstemius herbis
Vivis et Urtica."--HORACE, _Ep._ i, 10, 8.
"Mihi festa luce coquatar Urtica."--PERSIUS vi, 68.
[178:1] "L'ortie s'établit partout dans les contrées temperées à la
suite de l'homme pour disparaitre bientôt si le lieu on elle s'est ainsi
implanteè cesse d'etre habité."--M. LAVAILLEE, _Sur les Arbres_, &c.,
1878.
NUT, _see_ HAZEL.
NUTMEG.
(1) _Dauphin._
He's [the horse] of the colour of the Nutmeg.
_Henry V_, act iii, sc. 7 (20).
(2) _Clown._
I must have . . . Nutmegs Seven.
_Winter's Tale_, act iv, sc. 3 (50).
(3) _Armado._
The omnipotent Mars, of lances the almighty,
Gave Hector a gift--
_Dumain._
A gilt Nutmeg.
_Love's Labour's Lost_, act v, sc. 2 (650).
Gerard gives a very fair description of the Nutmeg tree under the names
of Nux moschata or Myristica; but it is certain that he had not any
personal knowledge of the tree, which was not introduced into England or
Europe for nearly 200 years after. Shakespeare could only have known the
imported Nut and the Mace which covers the Nut inside the shell, and
they were imported long before his time. Chaucer speaks of it as--
"Notemygge to put in ale
Whether it be moist or stale,
Or for to lay in cofre."--_Sir Thopas._
And in another poem we have--
"And trees ther were gret foisoun,
That beren notes in her sesoun.
Such as men Notemygges calle
That swote of savour ben withalle."
_Romaunt of the Rose._
The Nutmeg tree (_Myrista officinalis_) "is a native of the Molucca or
Spice Islands, principally confined to that group denominated the
Islands of Banda, lying in lat. 4° 30´ south; and there it bears both
blossom and fruit at all seasons of the year" ("Bot. Mag.," 2756, with a
full history of the spice, and plates of the tree and fruit).
OAK.
(1) _Prospero._
If thou more murmur'st, I will rend an Oak,
And peg thee in his knotty entrails,
_Tempest_, act i, sc. 2 (294).
(2) _Prospero._
To the dread rattling thunder
Have I given fire, and rifted Jove's stout Oak
With his own bolt.
_Ibid._, act v, sc. 1 (44).
(3) _Quince._
At the Duke's Oak we meet.
_Midsummer Night's Dream_, act i, sc. 2 (113).
(4) _Benedick._
An Oak with but one green leaf on it would have answered her.
_Much Ado About Nothing_, act ii, sc. 1 (247).
(5) _Isabella._
Thou split'st the unwedgeable and gnarled Oak.
_Measure for Measure_, act ii, sc. 2 (114).
(_See_ MYRTLE.)
(6) _1st Lord._
He lay along
Under an Oak, whose antique root peeps out
Upon the brook that brawls along this wood.
_As You Like It_, act ii, sc. 1 (30).
(7) _Oliver._
Under an Oak, whose boughs were Mossed with age,
And high top bald with dry antiquity.
_Ibid._, act iv, sc. 3 (156).
(8) _Paulina._
As ever Oak or stone was sound.
_Winter's Tale_, act ii, sc. 3 (89).
(9) _Messenger._
And many strokes, though with a little axe,
Hew down and fell the hardest-timber'd Oak.
_3rd Henry VI_, act ii, sc. 1 (54).
(10) _Mrs. Page._
There is an old tale goes that Herne the Hunter,
Sometime a keeper here in Windsor Forest,
Doth all the winter time at still midnight
Walk round about an Oak, with great ragg'd horns.
* * * * *
_Page._
Why yet there want not many that do fear
In deep of night to walk by this Herne's Oak.
* * * * *
_Mrs. Ford._
That Falstaff at that Oak shall meet with us.
_Merry Wives of Windsor_, act iv, sc. 4 (28).
_Fenton._
To night at Herne's Oak.
_Merry Wives of Windsor_, act iv, sc. 6 (19).
_Falstaff._
Be you in the park about midnight at Herne's Oak, and you
shall see wonders.
_Ibid._, act v, sc. 1 (11).
_Mrs. Page._
They are all couched in a pit hard by Herne's Oak.
* * * * *
_Mrs. Ford._
The hour draws on. To the Oak, to the Oak!
_Ibid._, act v, sc. 3 (14).
_Quickly._
Till 'tis one o'clock
Our dance of custom round about the Oak
Of Herne the Hunter, let us not forget.
_Ibid._, act v, sc. 5 (78).
(11) _Timon._
That numberless upon me stuck as leaves
Do on the Oak, have with one winter's brush
Fell from their boughs, and left me open, bare
For every storm that blows.