And Lord Bacon, speaking of the mandrake, says"Some plants there are, but rare, that have a mossie or downy root, and likewise that have a number of threads, like beards, as mandrakes, whereof witches and impostours make an ugly image, giving it the form of a face at the top of the root, and leave those strings to make a broad beard down to the foot.

" Moore gives this warning: "The phantom shapesoh, touch them not That appal the maiden's sight, Look in the fleshy mandrake's stem,

By virtue of a similar association of ideas, for instance, the gin-seng was said by the Chinese and North American Indians to possess certain virtues which were deduced from the shape of the root, supposed to resemble the human body a plant with which may be compared our mandrake.

In Silesia, Thuringia, and Bohemia the mandrake is, in addition to its many mystic properties, connected with the idea of hidden treasures.

The mandrake, as a mystic plant, was extensively sold for medicinal purposes, and in Kent may be occasionally found kept to cure barrenness; and it may be remembered that La Fontaine's fable, La Mandragore, turns upon its supposed power of producing children.

In days gone by, when the mandrake was an object of superstitious veneration by reason of its supernatural character, the Germans made little idols of its root, which were consulted as oracles.

Oftentimes substituted for the mandrake was the briony, which designing people sold at a good profit.

Gerarde informs us, "How the idle drones, that have little or nothing to do but eat and drink, have bestowed some of their time in carving the roots of briony, forming them to the shape of men and women, which falsifying practice hath confirmed the error amongst the simple and unlearned people, who have taken them upon their report to be the true mandrakes."

Many other equally curious stories are told of the mandrake, a plant which, for its mystic qualities, has perhaps been unsurpassed; and it is no wonder that it was a dread object of superstitious fear, for Moore, speaking of its appearance, says: "Such rank and deadly lustre dwells, As in those hellish fires that light The mandrake's charnel leaves at night.

Many other equally curious stories are told of the mandrake, a plant which, for its mystic qualities, has perhaps been unsurpassed; and it is no wonder that it was a dread object of superstitious fear, for Moore, speaking of its appearance, says: "Such rank and deadly lustre dwells, As in those hellish fires that light The mandrake's charnel leaves at night.

But these mandrake fables are mostly of foreign extraction and of very ancient date.

Dr. Daubeny, in his "Roman Husbandry," has given a curious drawing from the Vienna MS. of Dioscorides in the fifth century, representing the Goddess of Discovery presenting to Dioscorides the root of the mandrake (of thoroughly human shape), which she has just pulled up, while the unfortunate dog which had been employed for that purpose is depicted in the agonies of death.

I don't know that this last charge has been before brought against 'em, nor either the sour milk or the mandrake babe; but I affirm these be things a witch would do if she could.

Some short distance from the shack was a clearing in the woods, a thriving wilderness of bramble-bushes, poke-berries, myrtle-berries, mandrakes, milkweed, mullein, daisies and what nota paradise of every sauntering vine and splendid, saucy weed.

then this ambiguous doubt No man can better than myself decide; That compound powder was of poppy made and mandrakes, Of purpose to cast one into a sleep, To ease the deadly pain of him whose leg Should be saw'd off; That powder gave I to the schoolmaster.

Nay, slight it not: the dismall ravens noate Or mandrakes screches, to a long-sick man Is not so ominous as the heareing of it Will be to you; 'twill like a frost congeale Your lively heate,yet it must out, our frendship Forbids concealment.

How I tugged at the mandrakes of speech!

2. of Mandrake.

Mandrake apples, Lemnius lib. herb.

He and his servants have often digged up mandrakes, and are not only still alive, but listened in vain for the dreadful scream.

The May-apple, or Mandrake, a wild fruit, is a favourite with our young folks; it grows on a single-steemed plant, usually one foot high, and is about the size of a plum, but with seeds, and in taste resembling a highly flavoured pear.

Sarah Mandrake.

R558031. Mandrake the magician and the flame pearls.

The King bent down and picked up the vial, then dropped it quickly, saying, "Odd's fish, the female that did don man's attire and flirt about with foppish airs is trying to play the hen and has made a nest and gone to setting on spoiled eggs that will hatch nothing but shades, and wraiths, and mandrakes!"

The mandrake very frequently has a forked root, which may be fancied to resemble thighs and legs.