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Chinese Liao chai chih ye (a.d. 60— 70), it is recorded that two friends
wandering among the mountains culling simples, find at a fairy
bridge two lovely maidens guarding i t ; at their invitation, the two
friends cross this “ azure bridge ” and are regaled with Huma
(Hemp—the Chinese Hashish); forthwith they fall deeply in love
with their hostesses, and spend with them in the Jasper City what
appears to them a few blissful d a y s : at length, becoming homesick,
they return, to find that seven generations have passed, and
that they have become centenarians. To dream of Hemp betokens
ill-luck. Astrologers assign Hemp to the rule of Saturn.
H E N B A N E .—There are two species of Henbane {Hyoscyamus),
the black and the white : the black or common Henbane
grows on waste land by roadsides, and bears pale, woolly, clammy
leaves, with venomous-looking cream-coloured flowers, and has a
foetid smell. Pliny calls this black Henbane a plant of ill omen,
employed in funeral repasts, and scattered on tombs. The ancients
thought that sterility was the result of eating this sinister plant,
and that babes at the breast were seized with convulsions if the
mother had partaken of it. Henbane was called Insana, and was
believed to render anyone eating it stupid and drowsy: it was also
known as Altevculum, because those that had partaken of it became
light-headed and quarrelsome. According to Plutarch, the dead
were crowned with chaplets of Henbane, and their tombs decorated
with the baneful plant, which, for some unknown reason, was also
employed to form the chaplets of victors at the Olympic games.
Hercules is sometimes represented with a crown of Henbane.
Priests were forbidden to eat Henbane, but the horses of Juno fed
on i t ; and to this day, on the Continent, Henbane is prescribed
for certain equine disorders. Albertus Magnus calls Henbane the
sixth herb of Jupiter, and recommends it especially for liver complaints.
In Sanscrit, Henbane is called Aj'amoda, or Goat’s Joy.
Both sheep and goats will eat the plant sparingly, but swine are
said really to like it, and in England it is well known as Hog’s Bean.
In Piedmont, there is a tradition that if a hare be sprinkled
with Henbane juice, all the hares in the neighbourhood will run
away. They also have a saying, when a mad dog dies, that he has
tasted Henbane. In Germany, there is a superstitious belief
that Henbane will attracfl rain. The English name of Henbane
was given to the plant on account of the baneful effedts of its seed
upon poultry, for, according to Matthiolus, birds that have eaten the
seeds perish soon after, as do fishes also. Anodyne necklaces,
made of pieces of this root, are sometimes worn by infants to
facilitate teething, and the leaves are smoked by country people to
allay toothache. Gerarde says, “ The root boiled with vinegre,
and the same holden hot in the mouth, easeth the pain of the teeth.
The seed is used by mountebank tooth-drawers, which run about
the country, to cause worms to come forth of the teeth, by burning
it in a chafing-dish of coles, the party holding his mouth over the
p f a n t b o ro , bcgeQb/, ori^ bijric/'. 373
fume thereof; but some crafty companions, to gain money, convey
small lute-strings into the water, persuading the patient that those
small creepers came out of his mouth or other parts which he
intended to cure.” The plant was one of those sought for by
witches, and used in their potions.
“ And I ha’ been plucking plants among
Hemlock, Henbane, Adder’s-tongue.— fonson.
Astrologers place Henbane under the rule of Saturn."
H E N N A .—In the Canticles, the royal poet says: “ My beloved
is unto me as a cluster of Camphire in the vineyards of
Engedi.” The Camphire mentioned here, and in other parts of
Scripture, is the same shrub which the Arabs call Henna {Lawsonia
inermis), the leaves of which are still used by women in the East to
impart a ruddy tint to the palms of their hands and the soles of their
feet. _ Throughout Egypt, India, Persia, Arabia, and Greece, it is
held in universal estimation for its beauty and sweet perfume. Mohammed
pronounced it the chief of the sweet-scented fiowers'of this
world and of the next. In Egypt, the fiowers are sold in the street,
the vendor calling out as he proceeds—“ O, odours of Paradise !
O fiowers of the Henna ! ” The Egyptian women obtain from the
powdered leaves a paste, with which they stain their fingers and
feet an orange colour that will last for several weeks. This they
esteem an ornament. Gerarde describes the Henna, or Henne-
bush, as a kind of Privet, which in his day grew in Syria near the
city Ascalon, and he says “ Bellonius writeth that not onely the
hciirc, but also the nether parts of nian s body, and nailes likewise, are
colored and died herewith, which is counted an ornament among
the T u rk / The Hindus call the Henna-fiower Mindi, and the
females, like the Egyptians, employ it to colour their nails, fingers,
and the soles of their feet an orange hue. The miraculous stone,
which they call Gauvi, or Parvati, received its name and its ruddy
colour from being touched by the foot of the divine wife of Siva,
which had previously been stained with the juice of Mindi. Henna-
fiowers are of a pale yellow tint, and emit a sweet perfume ; they
are made into garlands by the Hindus, and offered to travellers in
official ceremonies ; thus we read that at the reception of M.
Rousselet by the King of Gwalior, the ceremony concluded by the
guests being decked with garlands of Henna-fiowers, placed around
their necks and hands. An extracff prepared from these flowers is
employed in religious ceremonies.
H E R B B E N N E T T .—The Avens, Herb Bennett, or Herba
Benedida {Geum urbanum),^ occurs as an architecilural decoration
towards the end of the thirteenth century, and is found associated
with old church paintings. The Holy Trinity and the five wounds
of our Lord are thought to be symbolised in its trefoiled leaf and
the five golden petals of its blossom. The flower has several rural
names, such as Star of the Earth, Goldy-fiower, and Blessed Herb
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