A nievve herball, or historie of plantes wherin is contayned the vvhole discourse and perfect description of all sortes of herbes and plantes: their diuers [and] sundry kindes: their straunge figures, fashions, and shapes: their names, natures, operations, and vertues: and that not onely of those whiche are here growyng in this our countrie of Englande, but of all others also of forrayne realmes, commonly vsed in physicke. First set foorth in the Doutche or Almaigne tongue, by that learned D. Rembert Dodoens, physition to the Emperour: and nowe first translated out of French into English, by Henry Lyte Esquyer.

❀ The Description.

[ 1] The Cloue gillofer hath long small blades, almost like Leeke blades. The stalke is round, and of a foote and halfe long, full of ioyntes and knops, & it

beareth two leaues at euery ioynt or knot. The floures grow at the top of the stalkes or stemmes, out of long round, smooth huskes and dented or toothed a∣boue like the spice called cloaues, or like to a littell crownet, out of the whiche the small feathered leaues do grow rounde about, spread in compasse, whereof some be of colour white, some carnation, or of a liuely flesshe colour, some be of a cleare or bright redde, some of a darke or deepe redde, and some speckled, and do all smell almost like Cloues. Whan the floures be past, there groweth in the sayde round cuppes or huskes, other long poynted huskes like barlie cornes, in which the small blacke seede is inclosed.

[illustration]

Armerius flos primus. Sweete Williams.

[illustration]

Armerius flos tertius.

[illustration]

Vetonica syluestris. Wilde Williams, or Cockow Gillofers.

[ 2] The Pynkes, and small feathered Gillofers, are like to the double or cloaue Gillofers in leaues, stalkes, & floures, sauing they be single and a great deale smaller. The leaues be long & narrow, almost like grasse, the smal stemmes are slender and knottie, vpon whiche growe the sweete smelling floures, like to the Gillofers aforesayde, sauing eache floure is single, with fiue or sixe small leaues, deepe and finely snipt, or frenged like to small feathers, of white, redde, and carnation colour, after whiche floures there groweth also in the rounde huskes, other sharpe huskes, or as it were long pellottes, in the which the seede is conteyned.

[ 3] The first sweete William or Colmenier (which is now called in Latine Ar∣merius flos) is also somwhat like to the cloaue Gillofers, their leaues be nar∣row, their stalkes ioyntie, & their floures small, like to littell Gillofers, grow∣ing

three or foure togither at the toppe of the stalkes, & somtimes nine or tenne togither, like to a nosegay or small bundell of floures, of colour sometimes red, and sometimes spotted with white, and somtimes (but very seldom) all white.

There is an other kind of Armeriorum, whose leaues be broade, almost like the leaues of floure Constantinople. The stalkes of this kinde, with the nūber of small floures growing togither, which are of colour redde and white, & spec∣kled or sprinckled with small spots, are very like vnto the aforesayde Armerijs.

There is also a certaine thirde kinde Armeriorum, with thinne whitishe or faynte greene leaues, and slender smooth knottie stalkes, whiche in handling seemeth to be somwhat fatte or clammy, in the toppe of the sayde stalkes grow small floures clustering or growing rounde togither, of a fayre wasshed purple redde colour, after them commeth narrow seede vessels, or small huskes like as in the other Gillofers, wherein the seede is conteyned.

[ 4] The wilde Gillofers are somewhat like to Armeria or Colmeniers: they haue also small knottie stalkes, & narrow leaues, but yet they be larger, shorter, & a great deale whiter greene, than the leaues of the gillofers or Pinkes. The floures be most cōmonly redde, & somtimes also white, & deepely cut or iagged, almost like to white Pinkes or Soppes in wine, but without sauour. The floures gone, the seede growth in long huskes like to Pynkes, or feathered Gillofers.