"Two large Potatoes passed through kitchen sieve, Unwonted softness to a salad give." And Sir Thomas Overbury wittily said about a dolt who took credit for the merits of his ancestors: "Like the Potato, all that was good about him was underground." PRIMROSE. The Common Primrose (_Primula veris_) is the most widely known of our English wild flowers, and appears in the Spring as its earliest herald. [448] It gets its name from the Latin _primus_, first, being named in old books and M.S. _Pryme rolles_, and in the _Grete Herball_, Primet, as shortened from Primprint. In North Devon it is styled the Butter Rose, and in the Eastern counties it is named (in common with the Cowslip) Paigle, Peagle, Pegyll, and Palsy plant. Medicinally also it possesses similar curative attributes, though in a lesser degree, to those of the Cowslip. Both the root and the flowers contain a volatile oil, and "primulin" which is identical with mannite: whilst the acrid principle is "saponin." Alfred Austin, Poet Laureate, teaches to "make healing salve with early Primroses." Pliny speaks of the Primrose as almost a panacea: _In aqua potam omnibus morbis mederi tradunt_. An infusion of the flowers has been always thought excellent against nervous disorders of the hysterical sort. It should be made with from five to ten parts of the petals to one hundred of water. "Primrose tea" says Gerard, "drunk in the month of May, is famous for curing the phrensie." The whole plant is sedative and antispasmodic, being of service by its preparations to relieve sleeplessness, nervous headache, and muscular rheumatism. The juice if sniffed up into the nostrils will provoke violent sneezing, and will induce a free flow of water from the lining membranes of the nostrils for the mitigation of passive headaches: though this should not be tried by a person of full habit with a determination of blood to the head. A teaspoonful of powdered dry Primrose root will act as an emetic. The whole herb is somewhat expectorant. When the petals are collected and dried they become of a greenish colour: whilst fresh they have a honey-like odour, and a sweetish taste.