cherries.'" In the North of England the broad-dock (Rumex obtusifolius),
when in seed, is known by children as curly-cows, who milk it by drawing
the stalks through their fingers. Again, in the same locality, children
speaking of the dead-man's thumb, one of the popular names of the Orchis
mascula, tell one another with mysterious awe that the root was once the
thumb of some unburied murderer. In one of the "Roxburghe Ballads" the
phrase is referred to:--
"Then round the meadows did she walke,
Catching each flower by the stalke,
Suche as within the meadows grew,
As dead-man's thumbs and harebell blue."It is to this plant that Shakespeare doubtless alludes in "Hamlet" (Act
iv. sc. 7), where:--"Long purples
That liberal shepherds give a grosser name,
But our cold maids do dead-men's fingers call them."In the south of Scotland, the name "doudle," says Jamieson, is applied
to the root of the common reed-grass (Phragmites communis), which is
found, partially decayed, in morasses, and of "which the children in the
south of Scotland make a sort of musical instrument, similar to the oaten
pipes of the ancients." In Yorkshire, the water-scrophularia (Scrophularia
aquatica), is in children's language known as "fiddle-wood," so called
because the stems are by children stripped of their leaves, and scraped
across each other fiddler-fashion, when they produce a squeaking sound.
This juvenile music is the source of infinite amusement among children,
and is carried on by them with much enthusiasm in their games.
Likewise, the spear-thistle (Carduus lanceolatus) is designated Marian in
Scotland, while children blow the pappus from the receptacle, saying:--"Marian, Marian, what's the time of day,
One o'clock, two o'clock--it's time we were away."In Cheshire, when children first see the heads of the ribwort plantain
(Plantago lanceolata) in spring, they repeat the following rhyme:--"Chimney sweeper all in black,
Go to the brook and wash your back,
Wash it clean, or wash it none;
Chimney sweeper, have you done?":--