A further post in my series republishing The Folklore of Herbs (1946), a book by Katherine Oldmeadow, who was a significant figure in the British pagan revival.

CHAPTER V

THE STILLROOM

Long ago, a country house of any importance had its own stillroom, and its ruler, under the jurisdiction of the mistress of the house, was called the stillroom maid.

It would surely be difficult to find a more charming and interesting and fragrant profession, but whoever adopts it – the stillroom maid is coming back into fashion again – must be highly skilled in her art.

The stillroom maid of the past had command over the herb garden and the orchard, and it was her duty to see that the harvests of both were gathered at the right time and used for the good of the household.

She made herbal medicines, healing ointments, salves, syrups and conserves, aromatic vinegars and home-made wines, from herbs, fruits and flowers. She preserved fruit and berries, she candied violets, roses and cowslips, and made violet tarts, vine leaf fritters and rose leaf jam. She made perfumes, too, and scented candles; candles that never spluttered or smoked, but gave a soft, radiant light and a scent like new-mown hay.

She kept the cupboards and presses of the house and the bowls and jars in the living rooms full of pot-pourri made of rose leaves, lavender and scented leaves, cunningly mingled with sweet spices, and these lovely ghosts of summer scents would perfume the chambers and stir up happy memories of summer gardens. On her shelves she kept precious jars of oil of roses, for in those days new-born babes were washed in oil of red roses to comfort their tender limbs.

Last, but not least, she was expected to be the family beauty specialist and supply the ladies of the household with sweet waters for washing and wonderful creams and lotions made from elder flowers, primroses, and marigolds to keep their skin smooth and white. This distilling of herbs for beauty preparations was called “the toilet of Flora” by the Elizabethans.

Another of the stillroom maid’s duties used to be to see that the chambers were strewn daily with fresh, aromatic herbs; and she had also to make pomanders for the household.

Some years ago the author was shown a pomander which had once belonged to Charles II. It was a large golden ball, the inside divided into four compartments. These, in Charles’ time, would be filled with strong, aromatic essences to preserve the King from infection while travelling about during the great plague.

In the eighteenth century physicians carried walking sticks with a similar device inside the large knobs of the handle.

The more simple pomanders were made of oranges stuck all over with spicy cloves; and sometimes they were just aromatic herbs and spices enclosed in hard pastes, through which holes were pierced so that they could be worn round the neck.

Fragrances were considered a great specific against infection in days when plague, smallpox and cholera were constantly raging, and most people carried a sprig of rosemary or rue about their persons.

Country people, up to the nineteenth century, carried posies to church; a rose, a sprig of lad’s love or rosemary; a clove pink not only kept away infection, but was refreshing and reviving during the parson’s long sermon.

When the Court of Old Bailey opens for the session the Judge is still presented with a posy of sweet flowers, and aromatic herbs are strewn over the Bench. This is a relic of the old days, when pungent herbs were used in court to ward off the infection of the deadly gaol fever brought in by the prisoners from the cells of Newgate.

Pepys, in his famous diary, records the fear he felt on seeing the first dreaded plague crosses on the doors of London houses, and how he hastened to buy tobacco to chew, another herb which was then, and is now, considered a powerful disinfectant.

There is an interesting story told of “The Four Thieves’ Vinegar,” which proves the virtue of aromatic herbs.

When plague was raging at Marseilles certain robbers continually entered infected houses and plundered them without taking the dreaded sickness.

When these men were at last caught they were condemned to death unless they would disclose the secret of their immunity; and they described how they used rue, sage, mint, rosemary, wormwood and lavender, mixed with camphor and vinegar, and washed their hands and faces with the decoction before entering plague-stricken houses.

The stillroom would contain a good stock of these aromatic vinegars prepared by the stillroom maid, who always had some knowledge of the use of medicinal herbs and was able to assist her mistress in simple doctoring.

She would, of course, be superstitious, with a firm belief in charms, pagan rites and ceremonies connected with the stars. These she would practise while gathering her physic herbs, and it is probable that she would supplement them by muttering a few little monkish prayers.

She would be certain to gather some of her herbs by the light of the old moon, and others at dawn or in the dark; and she would have her seeds planted on Good Friday, the “blessed day.”

The room where the stillroom maid worked would be a fascinating, fragrant place with bunches of herbs, flowers and roots drying from the rafters, and very likely would hang among them a witch’s glass ball, a gaudy thing with coloured stripes that must never be dusted and was considered marvellous for keeping off the evil eye.

There would be a long table under the window, laden with jars of spring water, queer pots and funnels for distilling, a large pestle and mortar and a stag’s horn for mixing.

If the maid had work to do after sunset the room would be lit with home-made candles set in iron or pewter sticks; or, if the household were rich in beehives, a large, round lump of wax with a lighted wick fixed in it would lie in a silver basin set on a stool to fill the room with soft, warm radiance.

The shelves round the room would contain bottles and jars and a few books. Gerard’s Herbal would be sure to be one of them and the “Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry,” “Delights for Ladies” and manuscript books of recipes, written out beautifully by the ladies of the house.

Perhaps the mistress of the household would come in to praise the rose petal jam, or to scold the maid because the master had complained at supper that the lambs’ wool ale lacked flavour.

Or it might be to order a honey posset to be sent up to Mistress Anne, who had a hoarseness, poor maid! And a kitchen wench had been discovered weeping with pain in her teeth, and it would be weeks before the fair, when the travelling dentist came round with his forceps. The wench must have a poultice of poppy heads and a soothing draught.

Perhaps the stillroom maid might smile at this, knowing that Molly, the kitchen maid, was not suffering from an aching tooth but an aching heart, caused by a faithless swain. Well, well! She should have her poultice and a drop of balm tea, too; a grand thing for the melancholy!

The stillroom maid would prepare her healing herbs, and, having no clock, she would stir her posset for the time it took her to say two paternosters and ten Ave Marias; and then, taking her candle and her tray, she would first visit Mistress Anne, lying in a goose-feather bed hung all round with red damask curtains, and administer the honey draught. Then she must climb more stairs, up and up to those terrifying holes in the rafters known as the servants’ quarters, to doctor the kitchen wench. If she were good natured it is likely that she would feel at the pocket hanging from her waist and take out her precious charm, made from the root of a mandrake, and place it under the pillow of the love-lorn lass; for it was well known that there was naught as good as mandrake for unrequited love.

Molly would be sure to be cured by the morning, but whether by the poppy heads, the balm tea or the mandrake root charm no one would ever know. Possibly, it would be because of her explicit faith in all three.

And what of the cottagers, who possessed neither still-rooms nor large gardens filled with rare herbs, fruits and delicate scents?

They were quite content with the herbs of the fields and hedgerows and the homely ones that grew in their cottage gardens. They ate sage leaves with their daily bread and cheese, for it was said: “How can a man die with sage in his garden?” and they drank good nettle ale, cider and mead.

Wise mothers dosed their ailing daughters with the homely mugwort tea, having a firm belief in the old proverb:

“If they would drink nettles in March

And eat mugwort in May,

So many fine maidens 

Wouldn’t go to clay.”

For scents the country folk had sweet musk, gilly flowers, cabbage roses, lad’s love and rosemary; and country contentments kept their bodies healthy and their hearts light.