Dorman,[33] was the Mandioca, named from _Mani_, and _Oca_, house. By
the Mexicans marigolds are known as "death-flowers," from a legend that
they sprang up on the ground stained by, "the life-blood of those who
fell victims to the love of gold and cruelty of the early Spanish
settlers in America."

Among the Virginian tribes, too, red clover was supposed to have sprung
from and to be coloured by the blood of the red men slain in battle,
with which may be compared the well-known legend connected with the lily
of the valley formerly current in St. Leonard's Forest, Sussex. It is
reported to have sprung from the blood of St. Leonard, who once
encountered a mighty worm, or "fire-drake," in the forest, engaging with
it for three successive days. Eventually the saint came off victorious,
but not without being seriously wounded; and wherever his blood was shed
there sprang up lilies of the valley in profusion. After the battle of
Towton a certain kind of wild rose is reported to have sprung up in the
field where the Yorkists and Lancastrians fell, only there to be found:

"There still wild roses growing,
Frail tokens of the fray;
And the hedgerow green bears witness
Of Towton field that day."[33]

In fact, there are numerous legends of this kind; and it may be
remembered how Defoe, in his "Tour through Great Britain," speaks of a
certain camp called Barrow Hill, adding, "they say this was a Danish
camp, and everything hereabout is attributed to the Danes, because of
the neighbouring Daventry, which they suppose to be built by them. The
road hereabouts too, being overgrown with Dane-weed, they fancy it
sprung from the blood of Danes slain in battle, and that if cut upon a
certain day in the year, it bleeds."[34]

Similarly, the red poppies which followed the ploughing of the field of
Waterloo after the Duke of Wellington's victory were said to have sprung
from the blood of the troops who fell during the engagement;[35] and the
fruit of the mulberry, which was originally white, tradition tells us
became empurpled through human blood, a notion which in Germany explains
the colour of the heather. Once more, the mandrake, according to a
superstition current in France and Germany, sprang up where the presence
of a criminal had polluted the ground, and hence the old belief that it
was generally found near a gallows. In Iceland it is commonly said that
when innocent persons are put to death the sorb or mountain ash wi