Foxglove

Foxglove is a biennial of the plantain family, native to much of western Europe and to Morocco and now naturalised in North America and many other temperate lands. In its first year it forms only a rosette of leaves at ground level; in the second it raises a spire about one to one and a half metres tall, hung with drooping, tubular flowers that are usually purplish pink or white and patterned inside like lace. Every part is poisonous because of the heart-acting glycosides it holds, and the plant was the first source of the drug digoxin; the physician William Withering learned of its use for heart complaints from an old wise woman who healed. Grieve traces the English name to folksglove, the glove of the good folk, and lore across Britain and Ireland ties the plant to them: the spots inside the bells marked where elves had touched them, and a bent stalk meant a fairy was sheltering in a flower. Witches were said to wear the blossoms on their fingers. In Staffordshire, carrying the flowers indoors let witches into the house, yet in Ireland the same flowers were a charm against witchcraft. In magic its work is protection: grown in a garden it guards garden and home alike, and Welsh housewives once painted crossed lines on their stone floors with a black dye made from the leaves, to keep evil from coming in.