Natural history in Shakespeare's time : being extracts illustrative of the subject as he knew it / Made by H. W. Seager, M. B., &c. Also pictures thereunto belonging.

  • Seager, H. W. (Herbert West), 1848-
Date:
1896
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Natural history in Shakespeare's time : being extracts illustrative of the subject as he knew it / Made by H. W. Seager, M. B., &c. Also pictures thereunto belonging. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    a stranger in the dark gets him by some sleight to a tavern, where calling for two pints of sundry wines, the drawer setting the wines down with two cups, as the custom is, the Jumper tastes of one pint (no matter which) and finds fault with the wine, saying 'tis too hard, but Rose-water and sugar would send it down merrily ; and for that purpose takes up one of the cups, telling the stranger he is well acquainted with the boy at the bar, and can have twopennyworth of Rose-water for a penny of him, and so steps from his seat, the stranger suspecting no harm, because the fawn-guest leaves his cloak at the end of the table behind him. But this Jump [swindle] coming to be measured, it is found that he that went to take his rising at the bar hath stolen ground and out-leaped the other more feet than he can recover in haste, for the cup is leaped away with him, for which the woodcock that is taken in the springe must pay fifty shillings or three pound, and hath nothing but an old threadbare cloak not worth lo groats, to make amends for his losses {Dekker's Bellman of London ). Rose-water was also put in mince-pies ( Good Huswife's Treasury, p. 4). Take the seed of a Rose, and the seed of mustard, and the foot of a weasel, and hang these on a tree, and from thenceforth it will bear no fruit. And if the aforesaid be put upon a net, the fish will collect there. And if the said dust be put in a lamp, and then it be lighted, all men will seem to be as black as the devil. And if the said powder be mixed with olive-oil and quick sulphur, and a house be smeared with this while the sun is shining, it will appear to be all on fire, Albertus Magnus, Of Virtues of Herbs, § 15. Rosemary. There's rosemary, that's for remembrance. Hamlet, iv. 5, 175. So Winter's Tale, iv. 4, 74. Thev make hedges of it in the gardens of England, being a great ornament unto the same. Rosemary is spice in the German kitchens. The flowers, made up into plates with sugar after the manner of sugar-roset and eaten, com- fort the heart and make it merry, quicken the spirits and make them more lively, q^,.^^^^.^ . Herbal, s.v.