[484] "Glossary," vol. i. p. 150; see Dyce's "Glossary," p. 63.
_Clover._ According to Johnson, the "honey-stalks" in the following passage ("Titus Andronicus," iv. 4) are "clover-flowers, which contain a sweet juice." It is not uncommon for cattle to overcharge themselves with clover, and die, hence the allusion by Tamora:
"I will enchant the old Andronicus With words more sweet, and yet more dangerous, Than baits to fish, or honey-stalks to sheep."
_Columbine._ This was anciently termed "a thankless flower," and was also emblematical of forsaken lovers. It is somewhat doubtful to what Ophelia alludes in "Hamlet" (iv. 5), where she seems to address the king: "There's fennel for you, and columbines." Perhaps she regarded it as symbolical of ingratitude.
_Crow-flowers._ This name, which in Shakespeare's time was applied to the "ragged robin," is now used for the buttercup. It was one of the flowers that poor Ophelia wove into her garland ("Hamlet," iv. 7):
"There with fantastic garlands did she come Of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples."
_Cuckoo-buds._ Commentators are uncertain to what flower Shakespeare refers in "Love's Labour's Lost" (v. 2):
"When daisies pied and violets blue, And lady-smocks all silver-white, And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue Do paint the meadows with delight."
Mr. Miller, in his "Gardener's Dictionary," says that the flower here alluded to is the _Ranunculus bulbosus_; but Mr. Beisly, in his "Shakespeare's Garden," considers it to be the _Ranunculus ficaria_ (lesser celandine), or pile-wort, as this flower appears earlier in spring, and is in bloom at the same time as the other flowers named in the song. Mr. Swinfen Jervis, however, in his "Dictionary of the Language of Shakespeare" (1868), decides in favor of cowslips:[485] and Dr. Prior suggests the buds of the crowfoot. At the present day the nickname cuckoo-bud is assigned to the meadow cress (_Cardamine pratensis_).
[485] See Nares's "Glossary," vol. i. p. 212.
_Cuckoo-flowers._ By this flower, Mr. Beisly[486] says, the ragged robin is meant, a well-known meadow and marsh plant, with rose-colored flowers and deeply-cut, narrow segments. It blossoms at the time the cuckoo comes, hence one of its names. In "King Lear" (iv. 4) Cordelia narrates how