Now! Then! 2024! - Yorkshire On This Day

Excerpt

The envelope enclosing Maggie W.’s letter brought also a contribution from Johnnie W., her brother. Johnnie says he often goes wild-flower gathering, and here is his story of one of his expeditions: “One afternoon during the holidays I brought home about thirty different kinds of wild-flowers, all gathered by the hedgerows near Leeds. Some of them I know by their names, but more than the half I only know by sight. Those I did know were the following: bindweed, corn-cockle, ragged robin, heartsease, yarrow, forget-me-not, flowering rush, cranesbill, foxglove, mayweed, bird’s-foot, harebell, trefoil, and hawkbit. I got a number of different kinds of thistles, and a gentleman told me that one very common flower, which I did not think of picking at first, is called pink persicaria.” If Johnnie W. goes on asking questions about all the wildflowers he finds, he will soon be able not only to know the flowers by name, but to describe them. Perhaps some of the readers of this part of the Supplement will be able to give a fuller list of the wild flowers that may be gathered near their homes at this season.

Comment

Comment

I think he means Anthemis arvensis rather than Anthemis cotula, but I hope someone will improve on my guesses. Is the letter an editorial fake?

The previous article presents a rhyme sent in by Johnnie’s sister Maggie, which she sings at school with her classmates, and which she mistakenly believes to have been composed by her teacher – it turns up several years before in the USA:

Dear Aunty, did you ever have
A little baby brother?
I’ve got one, and I think
I never want another.

He is not big enough to stand
And play with hoop or ball;
And mother has to keep him –
So she cannot play at all.

It’s always, “Hush!” and “Jack, be still!
The baby is asleep,”
And everybody in the house
On tiptoe has to creep.

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Original

The envelope enclosing Maggie W.’s letter brought also a contribution from Johnnie W., her brother. Johnnie says he often goes wild-flower gathering, and here is his story of one of his expeditions:-

One afternoon during the holidays I brought home about thirty different kinds of wild-flowers, all gathered by the hedge-rows near Leeds. Some of them I know by their names, but more than the half I only know by sight. Those I did know were the following:- Bindweed, corn-cockle, ragged robin, heart’s ease, yarrow, forget-me-not, flowering rush, crane-bill, foxglove, mayweed, bird’s-foot, harebell, trefoil, and hawkbit. I got a number of different kinds of thistles, and a gentleman told me that one very common flower, which I did not think of picking at first, is called pink persicaria.

If Johnnie W. goes on asking questions about all the wild flowers he finds, he will soon be able not only to know the flowers by name, but to describe them. Perhaps some of the readers of this part of the Supplement will be able to give a fuller list of the wild flowers that may be gathered near their homes at this season.

205 words.

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• Achillea millefolium (1) ·
• Agrostemma githago (1) ·
• Anthemis arvensis (1) ·
• Botany (4) ·
• Butomus (1) ·
• Campanula rotundifolia (1) ·
• Child (17) ·
• Clover (1) ·
• Convolvulus (1) ·
• Digitalis (1) ·
• Flower (2) ·
• Flowering plant (2) ·
• Geranium (1) ·
• Hedge (2) ·
• Leeds Mercury (18), leading Whig newspaper founded by John Hirst in 1718, bought by Nonconformist-Liberal Edward Baines in 1801 and used to advocate some types of social and political reform, remained in the family for two more generations ·
• 📌Leeds (235) ·
• Leontodon (1) ·
• Myosotis (1) ·
• Ornithopus (1) ·
• Persicaria (1) ·
• Poetry (70) ·
• Silene flos-cuculi (1) ·
• Thistle (1) ·
• Viola tricolor (1) ·
• Walking (18) ·
• Wildflower (2) ·

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