"I learned it in England, where indeed they are most potent in potting. Your Dane, your German and your swag-bellied Hollander - drink, ho! - are nothing to your English." Iago to Casio in Othello, referring to a drinking song. Nothing new there. The remark would have gone down well with Shakepeare's audience, as it would with a contemporary English audience.
The lingering taste, and the thought, of wild ginger after a Thai meal in Sevenoaks this lunch time.
A charming book about the names of flowers tells me among other things that nasturtium comes from the latin nasus, nose, and tortus, twisted, because the pungent smell makes the nose wrinkle or twist. I prefer the French word for nasturtium, capucine, which refers to the shape of the flower, similar to a monk's hood.
2 comments:
Is that what you do in your potting shed?
It seems that Iago was quite a herbalist - "Not poppy, nor mandragora, nor all the drowsy syrops of the world..."
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