Free China Bayles' Book of Days by Susan Wittig Albert Page A

Southernwood: A. abrotanum , green and ferny. Especially useful as a border or green groundcover. Also used as a moth repellant
    • Desert sage: A. palmeri, used in purification smudging
     
    Learn how to grow and use artemisia:
    The Rodale Herb Book , edited by William H. Hylton

    FEBRUARY 13
I am fully and intensely aware that plants are conscious of love and respond to it as they do to nothing else.
—CELIA THAXTER (1835-1894)
    Love Charms
    Tomorrow is Valentine’s Day, so you might want to brush up on your herbal love lore. For centuries, plants have been important to lovers, for a whole bouquet of reasons! Here are a few you might not have thought of:
    • Honeysuckle. The scent of honeysuckle was thought to induce erotic dreams; hence, many parents forbade their daughters to bring it into the house.
    • Periwinkle. It was believed that people who ate periwinkle leaves together would fall in love. Another potion, less tasty: powdered periwinkle, houseleek, earthworms.
    • Bay. If you want to dream of your future lover, pin five bay leaves to the four corners and the center of your pillow, before you go to bed tonight. Be sure to repeat the traditional charm (it won’t work if you don’t): St. Valentine, be kind to me, in dreams let me my true love see.
    • Cornflower. A lover was advised to put a cornflower into his lapel. If the color stayed true-blue, the young lady would be his; if it faded, he’d lost her. Goethe’s Faust illustrates:
     
    Now gentle flower, I pray thee tell
If my lover loves me, and loves me well,
So may the fall of the morning dew
Keep the sun from fading thy tender blue.
    • Yarrow. A lady hoping to attract a reluctant lover was advised to walk through a patch of yarrow, barefoot at midnight under a full moon. She was to pick some blossoms (with her eyes shut), then take them home and put them under her bed. If the flowers were still fresh, it was a sign that her lover would come around to the idea before long; if the flowers were dry, she should think about looking for another fellow.
    • A two-leaf clover in your shoe could predict your mate:
     
    A clover of two, a clover of two,
Put it in your right shoe.
The first young man you meet,
In field or lane or street,
You’ll have him or one of his name.
     
    Learn how to use herbal love charms:
    Love Potions: A Book of Charms and Omens , by Josephine Addison
     
    In the floral calendar, today’s flower: yellow crocus.

    FEBRUARY 14
    Today is Valentine’s Day.
    Chocolate Is an Herb, Too!
    We’re not the first civilization to believe that chocolate is a gift of the gods. The Mayans worshipped the cacao plant ( Theobroma cacao ), used its beans as currency, and brewed them into a medicinal drink called xocolatl . The Aztecs believed that the god of agriculture carried the plant to earth. Clever folks: they mixed it with chile peppers and used it as an aphrodisiac.
    The Spanish explorers knew a good thing when they saw it, and took the cacao beans home to make a drink for their wealthy patrons, who naturally added sugar to sweeten the bitter brew. Doctors prescribed the new drink for everything from tuberculosis to intestinal parasites and sexual dysfunction. The French feared that chocolate might raise passions to an uncontrollable frenzy (you know those French), but the Brits loved it enough to take the risk, and before long, London was chock-full of chocolate houses. Chocolate-loving English emigrants took the confection with them to North America, and before you knew it, we had Hershey’s. More recently, scientists have learned that chocolate has twice as many antioxidants as red wine, that it relaxes blood vessels and reduces the risk of blood clotting—and that it triggers the same brain responses as falling in love. But you knew that already, didn’t you?
    MCQUAID’S HOT ’N’ SPICY CHOCOLATE
    This wintertime drink, reminiscent of the Aztec’s xocolatl , combines two of McQuaid’s favorite herbs, chocolate and chile