On your walk

Harebell (Campanula rotundifolia)

‘The azured harebell, like thy veins,’ wrote Shakespeare in Cymbeline, referring to the delicate, papery-blue flower of the ‘Scottish bluebell’, unfurling in dry, open spaces until September. Hare is from the Old English hara, meaning hairy—a reference to the trailing stems—but names including ‘witches’ thimbles’, ‘fairy bells’ and ‘old man’s bell’ (the Devil) indicate a mistaken association with the witch’s familiar, the hare. ‘Pick it at your peril’ was a common refrain. To dream of the hardy county flower of Co Antrim, Dumfriesshire and Yorkshire is to have a vision of true love, yet it also represents submission or grief. Its leaves are edible and the root was used by Native Americans to treat earache.