The Descritpion.

1. Vaccinia nigra, the black Whortle or Hurtle, is a base and low shrub or woody plant, bringing forth many branches of cubit high, set full of small leaves of a dark green colour not much unlike the leaves of Box or the Myrtle tree: amongst which come forth little hollow flowers turning into small berries, green at the first, afterward red, and at the last of a black colour, and full of a pleasant and sweet juice: in which do lie divers little thin whitish seeds: these berries do colour the mouth and lips of those that eat them, with a black colour: the root is woody, slender, and now and then creeping.

2. Vaccinia rubra, or Red Whortle, is like the former in the manner of growing, but that the leaves are greater and harder, almost like the leaves of the Box tree, abiding green all the winter long: among which come forth small carnation flowers, long and round, growing in clusters at the top of the branches: after which succeed small berries, in show and bigness like the former, but that they are of an excellent red colour, and full of juice, of so orient and beautiful a purple to limn withal; that Indian lacca is not to be compared thereunto, especially when this juice is prepared and dressed with alum according to art, as myself have proved by experience: the taste is rough and astringent: the root is of a woody substance.

3. Vaccinia alba, or the white Whortle, differs from the former in form and bigness; for it sends forth many stalks from the root, and these three, four, or five cubits high, thick, and divided into sundry branches, covered for the most part with a blackish bark: at the beginning of the spring it sends forth, from the buds at the sides of the branches, leaves all hoary and hairy underneath, and green above: from the midst of these, upon little footstalks stand clustering together many little flowers, consisting of five white leaves apiece without smell; and then the leaves by little and little unfold themselves and cast off their downiness, and become snipped about the edges. The fruit that succeeds the flowers is round, black; somewhat like, but bigger than a haw, full of juice of a very sweet taste; wherein lies ten or more longish smooth blackish seeds. It grows upon the Austrian and Styrian Alps, where the fruit is ripe in August. Clusius calls it Vitis idæa 3. Pena and Lobel, Amelancher: Gesner by divers names, as Myrtomalus, Petromelis, Pyrus cervinus, &c.

4. Carolus Clusius in his Pannonic Observations hath set down another of the Whortleberries, under the name of Vitis idæa, which differeth from the other Whortleberries, not only in stature, but in leaves and fruit also. The leaves are long, narrow, sharp pointed, full of veins, a little hairy, and lightly snipped about the edges, greener above than below: the fruit grows from the tops of the branches of the former year, hanging upon long footstalks, and being as big as little cherries, first green, then red, and lastly black, full of juice, and that of no unpleasant taste, containing no kernels, but flat white seeds commonly five in number: the stalks are weak, and commonly lie upon the ground: Clusius found it upon the Austrian mountain Snealben, with the fruit partly ripe, and partly unripe, in August. It is his Vitis ideæa 1.

5. The same author also setteth forth another of the Whortleberries, under the title of Uva ursi, which is likewise a shrubby plant, having many feeble branches, whereon grow long leaves blunt at the points, and of an overworn green colour: among which, at the tops of the stalks come forth clusters of bottle-like flowers of a whitish purple colour: the fruit followeth, growing likewise in clusters, green at the first, and black when they be ripe: the root is of a woody substance. This is always green.

6. This differs from the second, in that the leaves are thinner, more full of veins, and whiter underneath: the flower is like the common kind, whitish purple, hollow, and divided into fine parts; the fruit also is black, and like that of the described. This grows on divers mountainous places of Germany, where Clusius observed it, who made it his Vitis idæa 2.

The Place.

These plants prosper best in a lean barren soil, and in untoiled woody places: they are now and then found on high hills subject to the wind, and upon mountains: they grow plentifully in both the Germanies, Bohemia, and in divers places of France and England; namely in Middlesex on Hampstead Heath, and in the woods thereto adjoining, and also upon the hills in Cheshire called Broxen hills, near Beeston castle, seven miles from Nantwich; and in the wood by Highgate called Finchley Wood, and in divers other places.

The red Whortleberry groweth in Westmorland at a place called Crosby Ravenswaith, where also doth grow the Whortle with the white berry, and in Lancashire also upon Pendle hills.

Thus our author: I have seen none of these but only the first described, growing upon Hampstead Heath.

The Time.

The Whortleberries do flower in May, and their fruit is ripe in June.

The Names.

Whortleberries is called in High Dutch, Heydelbeeren: in Low Dutch, Crakeberien, because they make a certain crack whilst they be broken between the teeth: of divers, Haverbesien: the French men, Airelle, or Aurelle, as Iohannes de Choul writeth: and we in England, Worts, Whortleberries, Blackberries, Bilberries, and Bulberries, and in same places, Whimberries.

Most of the shops of Germany do call them Myrtilli, but properly Myrtilli are the fruit of the Myrtle tree, as the apothecaries name them at this day. This plant hath no name for aught we can learn, either among the Greeks or ancient Latins; for whereas most do take it to be Vitis idæa, or the Corinth tree, which Pliny surnameth Alexandrina, it is untrue; for Vitis idæa is not only like to the common Vine, but is also a kind of Vine: and Theophrastus, who hath made mention hereof doth call it, without an epithet, Ampelos, simply, as a little after we will declare; which without doubt he would not have done if he had found it to differ from the common Vine: For what things soever receive a name of some plant, the same are expressed with some epithet added to be known to differ from others. as Laurus alexandrina, Vitis alba, Vitis nigra, Vitis sylvestris, and such like.

Moreover, those things which have borrowed a name from some plant are like thereunto, if not wholly, yet either in leaf or fruit, or in some other thing. Vitis alba & nigra, that is, the white and black Bryonies, have leaves and clasping tendrils as hath the common Vine, and climb also after the same manner: Vitis sylvestris, or the wild Vine, hath such like stalks as the Vine hath, and bringeth forth fruit like to the little Grapes. Laurus alexandrina, and chamædaphne, and also daphnoides, are like in leaves to the Laurel tree: Sycomorus is like in fruit to the Fig tree, and in leaves to the Mulberry tree: Chamædrys hath the leaf of an Oak; Peucedanus of the Pine tree: so of others which have taken their names from some other: but this low shrub is not like the Vine either in any part, or in any other thing.

This Vitis idæa groweth not on the uppermost and snowy parts of mount Ida (as some would have it, but about Ida, even the hill Ida, not of Candy, but of Troas in the lesser Asia which Ptolomy in his fifth book Of Geography, chap. 3. doth call Alexandri Troas, or Alexander his Troy: whereupon it is also advisedly named of Pliny, lib. 14. cap. 3. Vita alexandrina, no otherwise than Laurus alexandrina is said of Theophrastus to grow there: Laurus, surnamed alexandrina, and Ficus quædam, or a certain Fig tree, and Ampelos, that is to say the Vine, are reported, saith he, to grow properly about Ida. Like unto this Vine are those which Philostratus in the Life of Apollonius reporteth to grow in Mæonia, and Lydia, situated not far from Troy, comparing them to those vines which grow in India beyond Caucasus: The Vines there, saith he, be very small, like as be those that do grow in Mæonia and Lydia, yet is the wine which is pressed out of them of a marvellous pleasant taste. This Vine which grows near to Mount Ida is reported to be like a shrub, with little twigs and branches of the length of a cubit, about which are grapes growing aslope, black, of the bigness of a bean, sweet, having within a certain winy substance, soft: the leaf of this is round, uncut, and little.

This is described by Pliny, lib. 4, cap. 3, almost in the selfsame words: It is called, saith he, Vitis alexandrina and groweth near unto Phalacra: it is short, with branches a cubit long, with a black grape of the bigness of the Latins' Bean, with a soft pulp and very little, with very sweet clusters growing aslope, and a little round leaf without cuts.

And with this description the little shrub which the apothecaries of Germany do call Myrtillus doth nothing at all agree, as it is very manifest; for it is low, scarce a cubit high, with a few short branches not growing to a cubit in length: it doth not bring forth clusters or bunches, nor yet fruit like unto grapes, but berries like those of the Yew tree, not sweet, but somewhat sour and astringent; in which also there are many little white flat seeds: the leaf is not round, but more long than round, not like to that of the Vine, but of the Box tree. Moreover, it is thought that this is not found in Italy, Greece, or in the lesser Asia, for that Matthiolus affirmeth the same to grow nowhere but in Germany and Bohemia; so far is it from being called or accounted to be Vitis idæa or alexandrina.

The fruit of this may be thought not without cause to be named vaccinia, sith they are berries; for they may be termed of baccæ, berries, vaccinia, as though they should be called baccinia. Yet this letteth not that there may be also other vaccinias: for vaccinia is polysemos dictio, or a word of divers significations. Virgil in the first book of his Bucolics, Eclogue 10, affirmeth, that the written Hyacinth is named of the Latins, Vaccinium, translating into Latin Theocritus his verse which is taken out of his tenth Idyll.

Et nigræ Violæ, sunt & Vaccinia nigra.
["and there are Black Violets and Black Hyacinths"]

Vitruvius, lib. 7 of his Architecture doth also distinguish vaccinium from the Violet, and showeth, that of it is made a gallant purple; which seeing that the written Hyacinth cannot do, it must needs be that this vaccinium is another thing than the Hyacinth is, because it serves to give a purple dye.

Pliny also, lib. 16, cap. 18 hath made mention of vaccinia, which are used to dye bond-slaves' garments with, and to give them a purple colour.

But whether these be our Vaccinia or Whortleberries it is hard to affirm, especially seeing that Pliny reckoneth up Vaccinia amongst those plants which grow in watery places, but ours grow on high places upon mountains subject to winds, neither is it certainly known to grow in Italy. Howsoever it is, these our Whortles may be called Vaccinia, and do agree with Pliny's and Vitruvius his Vaccinia, because garments and linen cloth may take from these a purple dye.

The red Whortleberries have their name from the black Whortles, to which they be in form very like, and are called in Latin, Vaccinia rubra: in High Dutch, Rooter Heidelbeere: in Low Dutch, Roode Crackebessen: the Frenchmen, Aurelles Rouges: they be named in English Red Whorts, or Red Whortleberries. Conradus Gesnerus hath called this plant Vitis idæa rubris acinis: but the growing of the berries doth show, that this doth far less agree with Vitis idæa, than the black; for they do not hang upon the sides of the branches as do the black (which deceived them that thought it to be Vitas idæa) but from the tops of the sprigs in clusters.

As concerning the names of the other they are touched in their several descriptions.

The Temperature.

These Vaccinia or Whortleberries are cold even in the latter end of the second degree and dry also, with a manifest astriction or binding quality.

Red Whortleberries are cold and dry, and also binding.

The Virtues.

A. The juice of the black Whortleberries is boiled till it become thick, and is prepared or kept by adding honey and sugar unto it: the apothecaries call it Rob, which is preferred in all things before the raw berries themselves for many times whilst they be eaten or taken raw they are offensive to a weak and cold stomach, so far are they from binding the belly, or staying the lask, as that they also trouble the same through their cold and raw quality, which thing the boiled juice called Rob doth not any whit at all.

B. They be good for an hot stomach, they quench thirst, they mitigate and allay the heat of hot burning agues, they stop the belly, stay vomiting, stay the bloody flux proceeding of choler, and help the felony, or the purging of choler upwards and downwards.

C. The people of Cheshire do eat the black whorts in cream and milk, as in these South parts we eat strawberries, which stop and bind the belly, putting away also the desire to vomit.

D. The red Whortle is not of such a pleasant taste as the black, and therefore not so much used to be eaten; but (as I said before) they make the fairest carnation colour in the world.