Another instance is the mignonette of our French neighbours, known also as the “love-flower.”  One of the names of the deadly nightshade is belladonna which reminds us of its Italian appellation, and “several of our commonest plant names are obtained from the Low German or Dutch, as, for instance, buckwheat (Polygonum fagopyrum), from the Dutch bockweit.”  The rowan-tree (Pyrus aucuparia) comes from the Danish roeun, Swedish ruenn, which, as Dr. Prior remarks, is traceable to the “old Norse runa, a charm, from its being supposed to have power to avert evil.”  Similarly, the adder’s tongue (Ophioglossum vulgatum) is said to be from the Dutch adder-stong, and the word hawthorn is found in the various German dialects.

As the authors of “English Plant Names” remark (Intr. xv.), many north-country names are derived from Swedish and Danish sources, an interesting example occurring in the word kemps, a name applied to the black heads of the ribwort plantain (Plantago lanceolata).  The origin of this name is to be found in the Danish kaempe, a warrior, and the reason for its being so called is to be found in the game which children in most parts of the kingdom play with the flower-stalks of the plantain, by endeavouring to knock off the heads of each other’s mimic weapons.  Again, as Mr. Friend points out, the birch would take us back to the primeval forests of India, and among the multitudinous instances of names traceable to far-off countries may be mentioned the lilac and tulip from Persia, the latter being derived from thoulyban, the word used in Persia for a turban.  Lilac is equivalent to lilag, a Persian word signifying flower, having been introduced into Europe from that country early in the sixteenth century by Busbeck, a German traveller.  But illustrations of this land are sufficient to show from how many countries our plant names have been brought, and how by degrees they have become interwoven into our own language, their pronunciation being Anglicised by English speakers.

Many plants, again, have been called in memory of leading characters in days gone by, and after those who discovered their whereabouts and introduced them into European countries.  Thus the fuchsia, a native of Chili, was named after Leonard Fuchs, a well-known German botanist, and the magnolia was so called in honour of Pierre Magnol, an eminent writer on botanical subjects.  The stately dahlia after Andrew Dahl, the Swedish botanist.  But, without enumerating further instances, for they are familiar to most readers, it may be noticed that plants which embody the names of animals are very numerous indeed.  In many cases this has resulted from some fancied resemblance to some part of the animal named; thus from their long tongued-like leaves, the hart’s-tongue, lamb’s-tongue, and ox-tongue were so called, while some plants have derived their names from the snouts of certain animals,