A walk on the wildside
THE FLOWERS OF THE WAYSIDE
The rain of the recent weekend gave a new lease of life to our hedgerows and to their abundant garlands of wild flowers, not for many years has there been such a profusion of foxgloves, there are many different names for this flower. In this area many people call them fairy thimbles and in parts of England they are known by another poetic name, Fairies Petticoat.
These tall, stately flowers have a charm that is all their own, no matter what name they are known by, William Graveson the author of the book, British Wild Flowers, first published in 1918 believed that the name foxglove derived from Folks Glove, in Norwegian folklore it was believed that the bell-like flowers were rung by the fairies at mid-Summer revels. The following are a few lines from The Song of the Foxglove Fairy by Cicely M. Barker.
Foxglove, Foxglove, what see you now, The soft Summer moonlight
On bracken, grass and bough And all the fairies dancing As only they know how. Along the road-side at Cregg Olympry and up in the heights of Coolmucky, after the showers, the sweet scent of honey Suckle comes wafting in the evening air, attracting bees and butterflies. Shakespeare refers to them in A Midsummer Nights Dream thus;
Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms So doth the Woodbine, the sweet Honeysuckle
Gently entwist. He is referring to the climbing stem of the honeysuckle, the encircling coils of which become so tight on its host tree that they actually bite into the bark. This is described very well by Cicely M. Barker in The Song of the Honeysuckle Fairy
The lane is deep, the bank is steep, The tangled hedge is high,
And clinging, twisting, up I creep, And climb towards the sky,
Oh Honeysuckle, mounting high, Oh, Woodbine, climbing to the sky.
It only seems a few short days ago that the elders were putting forth their creamy, white blossoms, these make a very refreshing drink, which, thanks to my friends in Monagown in Conna, I have recently sampled. Already the elders are bearing little, purple berries, when ripe they make a wine to equal any Beaujolais, but the elder is not a popular tree with poets, perhaps because it grows profusely in waste ground. It is sometimes referred to as Bitter Elder or Stinking Elder, and it is very rare to see birds make their nest in its branches. Spencer in his long poem, The Shepherds Calender writes;
The Muses that were wont green Baies to wear, Now bringeth bitter Elder branches seare.
A certain Sir John Mandeville wrote that Judas hanged himself on an elder tree, and the name given to the fungus found on the stumps of fallen elders is Judases Ear. The rowan trees which grow so abundantly in our countryside will soon be putting out vivid red berries, providing a feast for the birds; this tree is much better known as The Mountain Ash. We will finish with a verse from The Song of the Mountain Ash Fairy;
Come all you blackbirds, bring your wives, Your sons and daughters too,
The finest banquet of your lives,
Is here prepared for you.