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Creevey describes it as growing, along with other wildings of such sweet names or quaint as Celandine, and Dwarf Larkspur, and Squirrel-corn, and Dutchman's breeches, and Pearlwort, and Wood-sorrel, and Bishop's cap, and Wintergreen, and Indian-pipe, and Snowberry, and Adder's-tongue, and Wakerobin, and Dragon-root, and Adam-and-Eve, and twenty more, which must have got their names from some fairy of genius.
The adder's-tongue, if plucked during the wane of the moon, was a cure for tumours, and there is a Swabian belief that one, "who on Friday of the full moon pulls up the amaranth by the root, and folding it in a white cloth, wears it against his naked breast, will be made bullet-proof."
This is one of the many weeds that Emerson binds into a bouquet in his "Humble-Bee:" "Succory to match the sky, Columbine with horn of honey, Scented fern and agrimony, Clover, catchfly, adder's-tongue, And brier-roses, dwelt among."
An enthusiastic botanical collector told me that for years he searched far and near for the adder's-tongue fern, till one day he stumbled upon it in a place over which he had long been in the habit of passing. There are few naturalists, I suspect, who could not narrate adventures of a like sort.
"It is a lily," corroborated Ethel Brown, "but it's called 'dog-tooth violet' though it isn't a violet at all." "What a queer mistake. Hasn't it any other name?" "Adder's-tongue. That's more suitable, isn't it?" "Yes, except that I hate to have a lovely flower called by a snake's name!"
Elder-flower ointment, however, keeps its ground, and is, I think, still made for sale in the shops of towns. But the true country elder-flower ointment contains a little piece of adder's-tongue fern, which is believed to confer magical virtue. So curious a plant may naturally have had a mysterious value attached to it in old times.
Creevey describes it as growing, along with other wildings of such sweet names or quaint as Celandine, and Dwarf Larkspur, and Squirrel-corn, and Dutchman's breeches, and Pearlwort, and Wood-sorrel, and Bishop's cap, and Wintergreen, and Indian-pipe, and Snowberry, and Adder's-tongue, and Wakerobin, and Dragon-root, and Adam-and-Eve, and twenty more, which must have got their names from some fairy of genius.
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