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 The strawberry is an interesting fruit, belonging
to the rose family, and unique because it is the only fruit with
seeds on the outside rather than the inside. It has been much
praised over the years: "Doubtless God could have made a
better berry, but doubtless God never did." So said the
17th century English writer, Dr. William Butler, and I for one
am inclined to agree.
Not that I would go so far as Madame Tallien, a prominent figure
at the court of the Emperor Napoleon, because she was famous for
bathing in the juice of fresh strawberries. She used 22 pounds
per basin although needless to say, she did not bathe daily.
Nor am I convinced of the necessity of a custom, still practiced
in Bavaria, of people tying small baskets of wild strawberries
to the horns of their cattle as an offering to elves. Mind you,
at least they only use small baskets of strawberries, so if they
do fail to convince the elves (who love strawberries) to
encourage their cows to produce an abundance of milk, at least
not much is lost.
You will also only lose half a strawberry if you follow
tradition as outlined in the legend which has it that if you
break a strawberry in half and share it with someone, you will
fall in love with eachother. Mind you, these days you might have
more success if you offered that special someone an entire
punnet of strawberries from The Apple Farm.
And even if that fails to have the desired effect, at least you
can be consoled in the knowledge that you have improved the
health of your suitor. Ancient Romans believed that the berries
alleviated symptoms of melancholy, fainting, inflammations,
fevers, throat infections, kidney stones, halitosis, attacks of
gout, and diseases of the blood, liver and spleen. While not all
these health benefits have been proved by medical science, some
have been, and as usual, there is more truth in these myths than
may once have been suspected.
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