Cuckow Flower, or Lady's smock.

Botanical name: 

Plate 14. Cardamine.

A VERY beautiful wild plant, frequent in our meadows in spring, and a great ornament to them. It grows a foot high. The leaves which rise from the root, are winged very regularly and beautifully, and are spread in a circular manner, the stalk is round, thick, firm, and upright. The leaves that grow on it are smaller, finely divided, and stand singly. The flowers grow in a little cluster, on that spike on the top, and from the bottom of the leaves. They are huge, of a fine white, often tinged with a blush of red.

The juice of the fresh leaves is to be used; it is an excellent diuretic, and is good in the gravel and all suppressions of urine. It also opens obstructions, and is good in the jaundice and green sickness; and a course of it against the scurvy.


The Family Herbal, 1812, was written by John Hill.