What Care and Circumspection should attend the choice and collection of
_Sallet_ Herbs, has been partly shew'd. I can therefore, by no means,
approve of that extravagant Fancy of some, who tell us, that a _Fool_
is as fit to be the _Gatherer_ of a _Sallet_ as a _Wiser_ Man. Because,
say they, one can hardly choose amiss, provided the Plants be green,
young, and tender, where-ever they meet with them: But sad experience
shews, how many fatal Mistakes have been committed by those who took the
deadly _Cicutae_, _Hemlocks_, _Aconits_, &c. for Garden _Persley_, and
_Parsneps_; the _Myrrhis Sylvestris_, or _Cow-Weed_, for _Chaerophilum_,
(_Chervil_) _Thapsia_ for _Fennel_; the wild _Chondrilla_ for _Succory_;
_Dogs-Mercury_ instead of _Spinach_: _Papaver Corniculatum Luteum_, and
horn'd _Poppy_ for _Eringo_; _Oenanthe aquatica_ for the _Palustral
Apium_, and a world more, whose dire effects have been many times sudden
Death, and the cause of Mortal Accidents to those who have eaten of them
unwittingly: But supposing some of those wild and unknown Plants should
not prove so _deleterious_ and [47]unwholsome; yet may others of them
annoy the _Head_, _Brain_, and _Genus Nervosum_, weaken the _Eyes_,
offend the _Stomach_, affect the _Liver_, torment the _Bowels_, and
discover their malignity in dangerous and dreadful _Symptoms_.
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