favourite of butterflies and other insects,
that in Britain alone upwards of thirty insects feed solely on the
Nettle plant, and it is one of those curious plants which mark the
progress of civilization by following man wherever he goes.[178:1]

But as a garden plant the only advice to be given is to keep it out of
the garden by every means. In good cultivated ground it becomes a sad
weed if once allowed a settlement. The Himalayan Boehmerias, however, are
handsome, but only for their foliage; and though we cannot, perhaps,
admit our roadside Dead Nettles, which however are much handsomer than
many foreign flowers which we carefully tend and prize, yet the Austrian
Dead Nettle (_Lamium orvala_, "Bot. Mag.," v. 172) may be well admitted
as a handsome garden plant.

FOOTNOTES:

[176:1] This a modern reading; the correct reading is "metal."

[177:1]

"Si forte in medio positorum abstemius herbis
Vivis et Urtica."--HORACE, _Ep._ i, 10, 8.

"Mihi festa luce coquatar Urtica."--PERSIUS vi, 68.

[178:1] "L'ortie s'etablit partout dans les contrees temperees a la
suite de l'homme pour disparaitre bientot si le lieu on elle s'est ainsi
implantee cesse d'etre habite."--M. LAVAILLEE, _Sur les Arbres_, &c.,
1878.

NUT, _see_ HAZEL.

NUTMEG.

(1) _Dauphin._

He's [the horse] of the colour of the Nutmeg.

_Henry V_, act iii, sc. 7 (20).

(2) _Clown._

I must have . . . Nutmegs Seven.

_Winter's Tale_, act iv, sc. 3 (50).

(3) _Armado._

The omnipotent Mars, of lances the almighty,
Gave Hector a gift--

_Dumain._

A gilt Nutmeg.

_Love's Labour's Lost_, act v, sc. 2 (650).

Gerard gives a very fair description of the Nutmeg tree under the names
of Nux moschata or Myristica; but it is certain that he had not any
personal knowledge of the tree, which was not introduced into England or
Europe for nearly 200 years after. Shakespeare could only have known the
imported Nut and the Mace which covers the Nut inside the shell, and
they were imported long before his time. Chaucer speaks of it as--

"Notemygge to put in ale
Whether it be moist or stale,
Or for to lay in cofre."--_Sir Thopas._

And in another poem we have--

"And trees ther were gret foisoun,
That beren notes in her sesoun.