All the other gifts appertinent to man, as the malice of this age shapes them, are not worth a Gooseberry.
The Gooseberry is probably a native of the North of England, but Turner said (s.v. _uva crispa_) "it groweth onely that I have sene in England, in gardines, but I have sene it in Germany abrode in the fieldes amonge other busshes."
The name has nothing to do with the goose. Dr. Prior has satisfactorily shown that the word is a corruption of "Crossberry." By the writers of Shakespeare's time, and even later, it was called Feaberry (Gerard, Lawson, and others), and in one of the many books on the Plague published in the sixteenth century, the patient is recommended to eat "thepes, or goseberries" ("A Counsell against the Sweate," fol. 23).
Tooth'd Briers, sharp Furzes, pricking Goss, and Thorns.
In speaking of the Furze (which see), I said that in Shakespeare's time the Furze and Gorse were probably distinguished, though now the two names are applied to the same plant. "In the 15th Henry VI. (1436), license was given to Humfrey, Duke of Gloucester, to inclose 200 acres of land--pasture, wode, hethe, vrises,[106:1] and gorste (_bruere, et jampnorum_), and to form thereof a Park at Greenwich."--_Rot. Parl._ iv. 498.[106:2] This proves that the "Gorst" was different from the "Vrise," and it may very likely have been the Petty Whin. "Pricking Goss," however, may be only a generic term, like Bramble and Brier, for any wild prickly plant.
[106:1] There is a hill near Lansdown (Bath) now called Frizen or Freezing Hill. Within memory of man it was covered with Gorse. This was probably the origin of the name, "Vrisen Hill."
[106:2] "Promptorium Parvulorum," p. 162, note.
I merely mention this to point out that "Gourd," though probably originally derived from the fruit, is not the fruit here, but is an instrument of gambling. The fruit, however, was well known in Shakespeare's time, and was used as the type of intense greenness--
"Whose cœrule stream, rombling in pebble-stone, Crept under Moss, as green as any Gourd."
How lush and lusty the Grass looks! how green!
Here, on this Grass-plot, in this very place To come and sport.
Why hath thy Queen Summon'd me hither to this short-grass'd green?