Give a dog .. .
Sir: R. D. Macleod's Key to the Names of British Plants, Pitman (my copy 1952), may help Peter Quince (27 March) in his need for a book about the origin of the names of wild flowers. This book lists the scientific (Latin) and common names, for both kinds are often interlinked. Dog's mercury is Mercurialis perennis: 'after Mer- cury, herald of the Roman gods, who was reputed to have discovered the plant (Pliny 25, 18).' It is called 'dog's' because of its 'inferiority' to M. annua, annual mercury, per- haps another way of saying Peter Quince's 'held in some disfavour.' There are references to flea- bane (though not blue, which any- way is purple), rocket, archangel and common rupture-wort, Her- niaria glabra, which perhaps at that time was not distinguished clearly from H. ciliolata Meld. (ciliated rupture-wort).
'Twitch' among farmers seems to cover a multitude of couch- like things, such as the bents and couch itself (Agreopyron repens), but the omission of Don's twitch from the key might be judged a fault. It is A. donianum after George Don (1764-1814), Scots botanist who first distinguished it. Like the rupture-worts it is rare and at present found only locally in the Highlands.
I have often enjoyed using Macleod's slim volume—there is also one on bird names—although it seems based on Bentham -and Hooker. Perhaps we are now due for a fatter one.
John Blackwood 27 East Barrmoss Avenue, Port Glasgow, Renfrewshire
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