Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 11.djvu/600

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. XL JUKE 19, im

vere Dei voluntas arriserit. . . . " This has practically the same effect as my emenda- tion, supplying a subject to arriserit, and introducing the mention of spring. Perhaps primo vere was the original phrase, primum being substituted when vere was mistaken for an adverb. Arriserit is clearly better than arrisit ; and after " collectum " the right reading is evidently " de terra." Heurtley has followed Migne's very unsatis- factory text : Migne's note shows that he had quite lost his way. W. E. B.

DOCTRINE OF SIGNATURES (10 S. xi. 209). Perhaps the chief English exponent of the doctrine of signatures in plants is William Coles, whose ' Art of Simpling ' was pub- lished in 1656, his 'Adam in Eden: or, Nature's Paradise,' in 1657. To the former work I have not access at present, but both Friend (' Flowers and Flower Lore ') and Folkard ('Plant Lore') refer to and quote from it as the most easily accessible authority on the subject. Both the writers just named deal at some length with the doctrine, but Folkard is much the fuller of the two, and he gives a list of authorities, including Porta, Grollius, Schroder, and Kircher. To these Friend adds the modern writers Prior (' Popular Names '), Farrer (' Primitive Man- ners and Customs '), Brand (' Popular Anti- quities '), Dyer ('Folk-lore of Plants'), and others.

The doctrine itself is succinctly set forth by Coles in a ' Short Explanation ' prefixed to the second of the two works referred to above, from which I quote :

" The signatures likewise are taken notice of, they being as it were the books out of which the Ancients first learned the Vertues of Herbes ; Nature, or rather the God of nature, having stamped on divers of them legible Characters to discover their uses, though he hath left others also without any, that after he had shewed them the way, they, by their labour and industry, which renders everything more acceptable, might find out the rest, which they did not neglect but prosequted with extraordinary diligence, yet have they left sufficient Inquiries for suc- ceeding ages."

As an instance of what is meant by signa- ture I may quote what Coles says in the same work of Bistort :

"This plant hath a double Signature, both proceeding from the Roots, the one from the colour of the inside of them ; the other from the writhed or twisted form. The bloody colour of the Roots betokeneth that it is effectual to stay the bleeding of the Nose, and all manner of mward bleeding and spitting of blood ; as also fluxes of the body, in man or woman, and also vomiting. . . .The wreathed form of the Root, is a sign that it is good against the bitings of serpents or snakes, for which it is found to be very effectuall,

as also for the venoming of Toads, Spiders, Adders, or the like venomous creatures."

I find no mention of this curious super- stition in Lyte or Gerard, nor do I remember to have met with it in Parkinson. C. C. B.

This superstition as to the supposed signs on plants of medicinal value is described in a book called ' Methodus Medendi,' by Sir William Allchin, published by H. K. Lewis, 136, Gower Street, 1908, on p. 29. He there refers, as his original authority, to ' The Art of Simpling ; or, an Introduction to the Knowledge and Gathering of Plants,' by W. Coles, London, 1656. Also to a 1 History of Chemistry,' by T. Thompson, 1830. J. FOSTER PALMER.

8, Roval Avenue, S.W.

Clue desired seems to be given by Safnt-

Srea in ' Les Vierges Meres,' Paris, 1908. e starts a series of quotations, on pp. 74- 78, from M. J. Gaffarel's ' Curiositez inouyes sur la sculpture talismanique des Persans horoscopes des patriarches et lectures des Estoilles' (s.l., 1631, pp. 85 and 88-89), thus :

" Cette the"orie est aujourd'hul peu connue ; mais elle fut repandue assez tard pour que I'abb6 Gaffarel, biblioth^caire du Cardinal de Richelieu, y ait encore donne 1 son adhesion. ' Je trouve aux plants,' dit-il, ' une infinite' de figures ad- mirables que les philosophes ont appe!6 Signa- turce rerum.' "

Furthermore, on pp. 115-117 Saintyves continues in line with this opening :

" Parfois, on serait tent6 de voir dans ces manducations d'animaux quelque application de la th^orie des signatures dont nous avons d4j& par!6 a propos des plantes."

ROCKINGHAM.

Boston, Mass.

"FOSSEL": "FOSSETT" (10 S. xi. 186). At 10 S. iv. 48 I adduced evidence that the word foslett or fostelett, though not appearing Tinder those forms in the ' N.E.D.* meant in the sixteenth century a box or casket. May not the term fossel, as applied to a diamond cut long instead of round, be another variant of the same word, signifying " of the shape of a box " ?

An instance of the use of the word fosset (which, with the definition casket or box, is given in the 'N.E.D.') occurs in 'The Descriptive Catalogue of Charters, &c., of the Borough of Weymouth,' by J. H. Moule (p. 61), where, in the record (1618-19) of the discovery of the corpse of a drowned man, it is mentioned that there were found in his pockets " only a pair of gloves and certaine fossetts." ETHEL LEGA-WEEKES.