groweth upon roote
Sche schal eek know, to whom it will do boote
Al be his woundes never so deep and wyde."

_The Squyeres Tale._

It is used in the same general way in the Bible, "the Grass of the
field."

In the whole range of botanical studies the accurate study of the
Grasses is, perhaps, the most difficult as the genus is the most
extensive, for Grasses are said to "constitute, perhaps, a twelfth part
of the described species of flowering plants, and at least nine-tenths
of the number of individuals comprising the vegetation of the world"
(Lindley), so that a full study of the Grasses may almost be said to be
the work of a lifetime. But Shakespeare was certainly no such student of
Grasses: in all these passages Grass is only mentioned in a generic
manner, without any reference to any particular Grass. The passages in
which hay is mentioned, I have not thought necessary to quote.

HAREBELL.

_Arviragus._

Thou shalt not lack
The flower that's like thy face, pale Primrose, nor
The azured Harebell, like thy veins.

_Cymbeline_, act iv, sc. 2 (220).
(_See_ EGLANTINE.)

The Harebell of Shakespeare is undoubtedly the Wild Hyacinth (_Scilla
nutans_), the "sanguine flower inscribed with woe" of Milton's
"Lycidas," though we must bear in mind that the name is applied
differently in various parts of the island; thus "the Harebell of Scotch
writers is the Campanula, and the Bluebell, so celebrated in Scottish
song, is the Wild Hyacinth or Scilla; while in England the same names
are used conversely, the Campanula being the Bluebell and the Wild
Hyacinth the Harebell" ("Poets' Pleasaunce")--but this will only apply
in poetry; in ordinary language, at least in the South of England, the
Wild Hyacinth is the Bluebell, and is the plant referred to by
Shakespeare as the Harebell.

It is one of the chief ornaments of our woods,[109:1] growing in
profusion wherever it establishes itself, and being found of various
colours--pink, white, and blue. As a garden flower it may well be
introduced into shrubberies, but as a border plant it cannot compete
with its rival relation, the Hyacinthus orientalis, which is the parent
of all the fine double and many coloured Hyacinths in which the florists
have delighted for the last two centuries.

F