“My shroud of white, stuck all with yew,
    Oh, prepare it;
  My part of death, no one so true
    Did share it.”

Unhappy lovers had garlands of willow, yew, and rosemary laid on their biers, an allusion to which occurs in the “Maid’s Tragedy":—­

  “Lay a garland on my hearse
    Of the dismal yew;
  Maidens, willow branches bear—­
    Say I died true. 
  My love was false, but I was firm
    From my hour of birth;
  Upon my buried body lie
    Lightly, gentle earth.”

Among further funeral customs may be mentioned that of carrying a garland of flowers and sweet herbs before a maiden’s coffin, and afterwards suspending it in the church.  Nichols, in his “History of Lancashire” (vol. ii. pt. i. 382), speaking of Waltham in Framland Hundred, says:  “In this church under every arch a garland is suspended, one of which is customarily placed there whenever any young unmarried woman dies.”  It is to this custom Gay feelingly alludes:—­

  “To her sweet mem’ry flowing garlands strung,
  On her now empty seat aloft were hung.”

Indeed, in all the ceremonial observances of life, from the cradle to the grave, flowers have formed a prominent feature, the symbolical meaning long attached to them explaining their selection on different occasions.

Footnotes: 

1.  See “Flower-lore,” p. 147.

2.  “The Ceremonial Use of Flowers.”

3. Fraser’s Magazine, 1870, p. 711.

4.  “Flower-lore,” pp. 149-50.

5.  Miss Lambert, Nineteenth Century, May 1880, p. 821.

6. Nineteenth Century, September 1878, p. 473.

7.  “Popular Antiquities,” 1870, ii. 24, &c.

CHAPTER XIII.

PLANT NAMES.

The origin and history of plant names is a subject of some magnitude, and is one that has long engaged the attention of philologists.  Of the many works published on plant names, that of the “English Dialect Society"[1] is by far the most complete, and forms a valuable addition to this class of literature.

Some idea of the wide area covered by the nomenclature of plants, as seen in the gradual evolution and descent of vernacular names, may be gathered even from a cursory survey of those most widely known in our own and other countries.  Apart, too, from their etymological associations, it is interesting to trace the variety of sources from whence plant names have sprung, a few illustrations of which are given in the present chapter.