The Old English Herbals Part 9

The full t.i.tle of Lyte's book is as follows: "A niewe Herball or Historie of Plantes: wherein is contayned the whole discourse and perfect description of all sortes of Herbes and Plantes: their divers and sundry kindes: their straunge Figures, Fas.h.i.+ons and Shapes: their Names, Natures, Operations, and Vertues: and that not only of those which are here growyng in this our Countrie of Englande but of all others also of forrayne Realmes, commonly used in Physicke. First set foorth in the Doutche or Almaigne tongue by that learned D. Rembert Dodoens, Physition to the Emperour: And nowe first translated out of French into English by Henry Lyte Esquyer."

(_Colophon._) "Imprinted at Antwerpe by Me Henry Loe Booke printer and are to be solde at London in Paul's churchyarde by Gerard Dewes."[75]

The beautiful ill.u.s.trations in Lyte's _Dodoens_ are to a large extent printed from the same blocks as those in the octavo edition (1545) of Fuchs. In Fuchs there are about 516 ill.u.s.trations, and in Lyte's _Dodoens_ about 870. Those which are not copied from Fuchs were probably collected by Dodoens himself, who, according to some verses at the beginning of the herbal, took a practical interest in the publication of the English translation of his book.

"Till Rembert he did sende additions store, For to augment Lyte's travell past before."

The original wood-blocks never came to England, and three years later van der Loe's widow sold them to Christophe Plantin for 420 florins.

All the commendatory verses at the beginning of Lyte's herbal are in Latin, except some lines in which William Clowes speaks of writing about herbs as "a fit occupation for gentlemen and wights of worthy fame," and recalls the great men who have immortalised themselves thereby, notably Gentius, Lysimachus, Mythridates and Dioscorides.

Then, after giving due praise to Dodoens, "Whose learned skill hath offered first this worthy worke to vewe," Clowes ends with four lines in which he plays upon the name of the translator:

"And Lyte, whose toyle hath not bene light to dye it in this grayne, Deserves no light regarde of us: but thankes and thankes agayne.

And sure I am all English hartes that lyke of Physickes lore Will also lyke this gentleman: and thanke hym muche therefore."

The herbal is dedicated to Queen Elizabeth "as the best token of love and diligence that I am at this time able to shew.... And doubtless if my skill in the translation were answerable to the worthynesse eyther of the Historie itselfe or of the Authours thereof I doubt not but I should be thought to haue honoured your Maiestie with an acceptable present." The preface is dated from "my poore house at Lytes carie within your Maiesties Countie of Somerset the first day of Januarie MDLXXVIII."

In 1606 there appeared the book commonly known as _Ram's little Dodoen_. It purported to be an epitome of Lyte's _Dodoens_, but, though some of its matter has been abridged from Dodoens's work, it is in reality a compilation of recipes unworthy of the great name it bears. In his preface the author tells us: "I have bestowed some tyme in reducing the most exquisit new herball or history of plants (first set forth in Dutch and Almayne tongue by the learned and worthy man of famous memory Dr. Rembert Dodeon (_sic_) Phisician to the Emperor, and translated into English by Master Henry Lyte Esq.), with a brief and short epitome ... so as where the great booke at large is not to be had but at a great price, which cannot be procured by the poorer sort, my endevor herein hath bin chiefly to make the benefit of so good, necessary and profitable a worke to be brought within the reach and compa.s.se as well of you my poore countrymen and women whose lives, healths, ease and welfare is to be regarded with the rest, at a smaller price than the great volume is. My onely and greatest care hath byn of long tyme to knowe or thinke how and upon whome to bestow the dedication of this my small labour. And in the penning of this my letter my Affections are satisfied with the dedication thereof to these my poore and loving countrymen whosoever and to whose hands soever it may come. For whose sake I have desired publicatio of the same, beseeching Almighty G.o.d to blesse us all."

The book is curiously arranged, for on one page we have "the practice of Dodoen," and on the opposite "the practises of others for the same Phisike helpes, collected and presented to the Author of this Treatise." There are directions for each month, and each is headed by a motto. The twelve mottoes, when read together, form the following quaint rhyme:--

"January. With this fyre I warme my hand February. With this spade I digge my land March. Here I cut my Vine spring April. Here I hear the birds sing May. I am as fresh as bird on bough June. Corn is weeded well enough July. With this sithe my gra.s.se I mowe August. Here I cut my corne full lowe September. With this flaile I earne my bread October. Here I sowe my wheats so red November. With this axe I kill my swine December. And here I brew both ale and wine."

There are some things in this little handbook worthy of remembrance, notably an imaginative pa.s.sage in which the author tells us that "herbs that grow in the fields are better than those which grow in gardens, and of those herbs which grow in the fieldes, such as grow on hilles are best."

FOOTNOTES:

[59] Then "Marie Valence Hall." (Founded in 1347 by Marie widow of Aylmer de Valence, Earl of Pembroke.)

[60] It has been suggested that Turner was imprisoned for his refusal to subscribe to the Six Articles and that he recanted to save his life. But, as Dr. B. D. Jackson has pointed out, Turner was made of sterner stuff and his whole life and writings are a standing contradiction to any such supposition.

[61] One of the earliest botanic gardens in Europe was at Bologna. It was founded by Luca Ghini. It is interesting to see how frequently Turner in his herbal quotes Ghini, and cites his authority against other commentators. Luca Ghini was the first who erected a separate professorial chair at Bologna for Botanical Science. He himself lectured on Dioscorides for twenty-eight years. He was the preceptor of Caesalpinus and Anquillara, two of the soundest critics on botanical writings of that age.

The most famous public botanical gardens in Europe during the sixteenth, seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries were the following. I give them in the order in which they were made:--

1533--Padua.

1544--Florence.

1547--Bologna.

1570--Paris.

1598--Montpellier.

1628--Jena.

1632--Oxford.

1637--Upsala.

1673--Chelsea.

1675--Edinburgh.

1677--Leyden.

1682--Amsterdam.

1725--Utrecht.

The first botanic garden in America was founded in Philadelphia by John Bartram, the great American botanist, in the middle of the eighteenth century.

[62] Gesner had a high opinion of Turner, of whom he wrote:--

"Ante annos 15, aut circiter c.u.m Anglicus ex Italia rediens me salutaret (Turnerus) is fuerit vir excellentis tum in re medica tum aliis plerisque disciplinis doctrinae aut alius quisquam vix satis memini."--_De Herbis Lunariis_, 1555.

[63] The Duke of Somerset was himself keenly interested in botanical investigations, and Turner frequently refers to the Duke's garden. It was during this time that Turner had his own garden at Kew. That he sat in the House of Commons is generally supposed from a pa.s.sage in his _Spiritual Physik_, and this view is sustained by the character of the Hunter in his _Romish Wolfe_.

[64] It has been a.s.serted in some accounts of Turner that he was a Canon of Windsor, but this is a mistake. The Canon of Windsor was Richard Turner, also a Protestant, and, like the herbalist, exiled during Mary's reign.

[65] Turner's widow subsequently married Richard c.o.x, who became Bishop of Ely. She founded a scholars.h.i.+p at Cambridge in memory of her first husband.

[66] It was for the same reason that Henry Lyte's translation of Dodoens was printed abroad.

[67] Pierandrea Mattioli (1501-1577) was physician successively to the Archduke Ferdinand and to the Emperor Maximilian II. With the exception of Fabio Colonna he was the greatest of the Italian herbalists.

[68] This was probably the John Falconer who sent English plants to Amatus Lusita.n.u.s, who taught physic at Ferrara and Ancona, and whose commentary on Dioscorides was published in 1553.

[69] Queen Elizabeth's love of gardening and her botanical knowledge were celebrated in a long Latin poem by an Italian who visited England in 1586 and wrote under the name of Melissus (see _Archaeologia_, VII.

120).

[70] Parkinson in his _Theatrum Botanic.u.m_ also mentions this use of bearfoot.

[71] He studied medicine at Montpelier under Guillaume Rondelet, who bequeathed him his botanical ma.n.u.scripts. D'Alechamps, Pena and Jean Bauhin, all famous herbalists, were also pupils of Rondelet.

[72] For full t.i.tle see Bibliography of Herbals, p. 210.

[73] This ma.n.u.script, now in the Vienna Library, was bought from a Jew in Constantinople for 100 ducats by Auger-Geslain Busbecq, when he was on a mission to Turkey.

[74] On one of his visits to England de l'Escluse met Sir Francis Drake, who gave him plants from the New World.

[75] For subsequent editions see Bibliography of Herbals, p. 211.

CHAPTER IV

GERARD'S HERBAL

"If odours may worke satisfaction, they are so soveraigne in plants and so comfortable that no confection of the apothecaries can equall their excellent vertue."--_Gerard's Herbal_, 1597.

When one looks at the dingy, if picturesque, thoroughfare of Fetter Lane it is difficult to realise that it was once the site of Gerard's garden, and it is pleasant to remember that the city of London in those far-off days was as noted for the beauty of its gardens as for its stately houses. The owner of this particular garden in Fetter Lane is the most famous of all the English herbalists. His Herbal,[76]

which was published in 1597, gripped the imagination of the English garden-loving world, and now, after the lapse of three hundred years, it still retains its hold on us. There are English-speaking people the world over who may know nothing of any other, but at least by name they know Gerard's Herbal. In spite of the condemnation he has justly earned, not only in modern times, but from the critics of his own day, for having used Dr. Priest's translation of Dodoens's _Pemptades_ without acknowledgment, no one can wander in the mazes of Gerard's monumental book without succ.u.mbing to its fascination. One reads his critics with the respect due to their superior learning, and then returns to Gerard's Herbal with the comfortable sensation of slipping away from a boring sermon into the pleasant s.p.a.ciousness of an old-fas.h.i.+oned fairy-tale. For the majority of us are not scientific, nor do we care very much about being instructed. What we like is to read about daffodils and violets and gilliflowers and rosemary and thyme and all the other delicious old-fas.h.i.+oned English flowers. And when we can read about them in the matchless Elizabethan English we ask nothing more. Who that has read it once can forget those words in the preface?--

"What greater delight is there than to behold the earth apparelled with plants as with a robe of embroidered works, set with Orient pearls and garnished with great diversitie of rare and costly jewels? But these delights are in the outward senses. The princ.i.p.al delight is in the minde, singularly enriched with the knowledge of these visible things, setting forth to us the invisible wisdome and admirable workmans.h.i.+p of almighty G.o.d."

And could any modern writer give with such simplicity and charm the "atmosphere" of the violet?