Note E209 — 39.
Reading edition
"Marigolds are hote and drye, an herbe well knowen and as vsual in the kitchin as in the hal: the nature whereof is to open at the Sunne rising, and to close vp at the Sunne setting. It hath one good propertie and very profitable for Students, that is by the vse thereof the sight is sharpened. And againe the water distilled of Marigolds when it flowreth, doth help the rednesse and inflammation of the eyes if it be dropped into them, or if a linnen cloth wet in the water be laid upon them. Also the powder of Marigolds dried, being put into the hollownesse of the teeth, easeth toothach. And the juice of the herbe mingled with a little salt, and rubbed often times vpon Warts, at length weareth them away."—Cogan's Haven of Health, ch. 63. Called in the Grete Herbal Mary Gowles, a name that seems to have originated in the A.S. mersc-mear-gealla = marsh-horse-gowl, the marsh marigold, or caltha, transferred to the exotic plant of our gardens and misunderstood as Mary Gold. It is often mentioned as Gold simply by our older poets:
"That she sprunge up out of the molde Into a floure was named golde." —Gower, ed. 1554, f. 120.
"The yellow marigold, the sunne's own flower," says Heywood in Marriage Triumphe, and "so called," says Hyll (Art of Gard. ch. xxx.), "for that after the rising of the sun unto noon, this flower openeth larger and larger; but after the noontime unto the setting of the sun the flower closeth more and more, so that after the setting thereof it is wholly shut up."
"The marigold observes the sun, More than my subjects me have done." —K. Charles I.