But meanwhile I forget how far we had gone.

Oh! lasciviousness; we here have ample choice.

Besides certain trees there is cyclamen, or sow-bread, which, according to an ancient dictum of Theophrastus, is symbolical of this sin because it was used in the preparation of love-philtres; the nettle, which Peter of Capua says is emblematic of the unruly instincts of the flesh; and the tuberose, a more modern introduction, but known as far back as the sixteenth century, when a Minorite Father brought it to France.

Its heady perfume, which disturbs the nerves, also, it is said, excites the senses.
"For envy there are the bramble and the aconite, which, to be sure, is more exactly assigned to calumny and scandal; and, again, the nettle, which, however, is also interpreted by Albertus Magnus as figuring courage and expelling fear.
"Greediness ?" The Abbe paused to think.

"Carnivorous plants, perhaps, as the fly-trap and the bog sundew." "And why not the humbler _cuscuta_, the dodder, the cuttlefish of the vegetable kingdom, which shoots out the antennae of its stems as fine as thread, attaching itself to other plants by tiny suckers and feeding greedily on their juices ?" asked the Abbe Gevresin.
"Anger," the Abbe Plomb went on, "is symbolized by a shrub with pinkish flowers, a kind of bitter-sweet, as it is popularly called, and by Herb Basil, which ever since the Middle Ages has had the same character ascribed to it of cruelty and rage as to its namesake, the basilisk, in the animal world." "Oh!" cried Madame Bavoil, "and we use it to season dishes and flavour certain sauces." "That is a serious culinary error and a spiritual danger," said the priest, smiling.