leaves are juicy, with a warm aromatic taste, and may be put
into sauce; or they make a good appetising condimentary pickle,
which is wholesome for scrofulous subjects. Persons living by the
coast cook this plant as a pot herb. Formerly, it was regularly cried
in the London streets, and was then called Crest Marine.

Shakespeare alludes in well-known lines to the hazardous
proceedings of the Samphire gatherer's "dreadful trade":--

"How fearful
And dizzy 'tis to cast one's eyes so low!
The crows and choughs that wing the midway air
Show scarce so gross as beetles: half-way down
_Hangs one that gathers Samphire_: dreadful trade!
Methinks he seems to bigger than his head."--_King Lear_.

[498] And Evelyn has praised the plant for excellence of flavour, as
well as for aromatic virtues against the spleen. Pliny says Samphire
is the very herb that the good country wife Hecate prepared for
Theseus when going against the Bull of Marathon.

Its botanic name is from the Greek _crithe_, "barley," because the
seeds are thought to resemble that grain. The title Samphire is
derived from the French _Herbe de St. Pierre_, because the roots
strike deep in the crevices of rocks. St. Peter's Wort has become
corrupted to Sampetre, Sampier, and Samphire.

A spurious Samphire, the _Inula crithmoides_, or Golden Samphire,
is often supplied in lieu of the real plant, though it has a different
flavour, and few of the proper virtues. This grows more abundantly
on low rocks, and on ground washed by salt water. Also a Salicornia,
or jointed Glasswort, or Saltwort, or Crabgrass, is sold as
Samphire for a pickle, in the Italian oil shops.

Gerard says of Samphire: "It is the pleasantest sauce, most familiar,
and best agreeing with man's body." "Preferable," adds Evelyn, "for
cleansing the passages, and sharpening appetite, to most of our
hotter herbs, and salad ingredients."

The Sea Holly (_Eryngium maritimum_), or Sea Hulver, is a
well-known prickly sea-green plant, growing in the sand on many parts
of our coasts, or on stony ground, with stiff leaves, and roots which
run to a great length among the sand, whilst charged with a sweetish
juice.

A manufactory for making candied roots of the Sea Holly was
established at Colchester, by Robert Burton, an apothecary, in the
seventeenth century, as they were considered both antiscorbutic, and
excellent for health.

[499] Gerard says: "The roots, if eaten, are good