time translated Cockle,[78:1] and
Newton, writing in Shakespeare's time, says--"Under the name of Cockle
and Darnel is comprehended all vicious, noisom and unprofitable graine,
encombring and hindring good corne."--_Herball to the Bible._ The Darnel
is not only injurious from choking the corn, but its seeds become mixed
with the true Wheat, and so in Dorsetshire--and perhaps in other
parts--it has the name of "Cheat" (Barnes' Glossary), from its false
likeness to Wheat. It was this false likeness that got for it its bad
character. "Darnell or Juray," says Lyte ("Herball," 1578), "is a
vitious graine that combereth or anoyeth corne, especially Wheat, and in
his knotten straw, blades, or leaves is like unto Wheate." Yet Lindley
says that "the noxious qualities of Darnel or Lolium temulentum seem to
rest upon no certain proof" ("Vegetable Kingdom," p. 116).

FOOTNOTES:

[78:1] "When men were a sleepe, his enemy came and oversowed Cockle
among the wheate, and went his way."--_Rheims Trans._, 1582. For further
early references to Cockle or Darnel see note on "Darnelle" in the
"Catholicon Anglicum," p. 90, and Britten's "English Plant Names," p.
143.

DATES.

(1) _Clown._

I must have Saffron to colour the Warden pies--Mace--Dates?
none; that's out of my note.

_Winter's Tale_, act iv, sc. 3 (48).

(2) _Nurse._

They call for Dates and Quinces in the pastry.

_Romeo and Juliet_, act iv, sc. 4 (2).

(3) _Parolles._

Your Date is better in your pie and your porridge than in your
cheek.

_All's Well that Ends Well_, act i, sc. 1 (172).

(4) _Pandarus._

Do you know what a man is? Is not birth, beauty, good shape,
discourse, manhood, learning, gentleness, virtue, youth,
liberality, and such like, the spice and salt that season a
man?

_Cressida._

Ay, a minced man; and then to be baked with no Date in the
pye; for then the man's date's out.

_Troilus and Cressida_, act i, sc. 2 (274).

The Date is the well-known fruit of the Date Palm (_Phoenix
dactylifera_), the most northern of the Palms. The Date Palm grows over
the whole of Southern Europe, North Africa, and South-eastern Asia; but
it is not probable that Shakespeare ever saw the tree, though Neckam
speaks of it in the twelfth century, and Lyte describ