  | (1) | Ariel. | Tooth'd Briers, sharp Furzes, pricking Goss, and Thorns,
Which entered their frail skins. | | Tempest, act iv, sc. 1 (180). | | | (2) | Quince. | One must come in with a bush of Thorns and a lanthorn, and say he comes in to disfigure, or to present, the person of Moonshine. | | Midsummer Night's Dream, act iii, sc. 1 (60). | | | (3) | Puck. | For Briers and Thorns at their apparel snatch. | | Ibid., act iii, sc. 2 (29). | | | (4) | Prologue. | This man with lanthorn, dog, and bush of Thorn,
Presenteth Moonshine. | | Ibid., act v, sc. 1 (136). | | | (5) | Moonshine. | All that I have to say, is to tell you that the lanthorn is the moon; I, the man in the moon; this Thorn-bush, my Thorn-bush; and this dog, my dog. | | Ibid. (261). | | | (6) | Dumain. | But, alack, my hand is sworn
Ne'er to pluck thee from thy Thorn. | | Love's Labour's Lost, act iv, sc. 3 (111). | | | (7) | Carlisle. | The woe's to come; the children yet unborn
Shall feel this day as sharp to them as Thorn. | | Richard II, act iv, sc. 1 (322). | | | (8) | King Henry. | The care you have of us,
To mow down Thorns that would annoy our foot,
Is worthy praise. | | 2nd Henry VI, act iii, sc. 1 (66). | | | (9) | Gloucester. | And I—like one lost in a Thorny wood,
That rends the Thorns and is rent with the Thorns,
Seeking a way, and straying from the way. | | 3rd Henry VI, act iii, sc. 2 (174). | | | (10) | K. Edward. | Brave followers, yonder stands the Thorny wood. | | Ibid., act v, sc. 4 (67). | | | (11) | K. Edward. | What! can so young a Thorn begin to prick. | | Ibid., act v, sc. 4 (13). | | | (12) | Romeo. | Is love a tender thing? It is too rough,
Too rude, too boisterous, and it pricks like Thorn. | | Romeo and Juliet, act i, sc. 4 (25). | | | (13) | Boult. | A Thornier piece of ground. | | Pericles, act iv, sc. 6 (153). | | | (14) | Leontes. | Which being spotted
Is goads, Thorns, Nettles, tails of wasps. | | Winter's Tale, act i, sc. 2 (328). | | | (15) | Florizel. | But O, the Thorns we stand upon! | | Ibid., act iv, sc. 4 (596). | | | (16) | Ophelia. | Do not, as some ungracious pastors do,
Shew me the steep and Thorny path to Heaven. | | Hamlet, act i, sc. 3 (47). | | | (17) | Ghost. | Leave her to Heaven,
And to those Thorns that in her bosom lodge,
To prick and sting her. | | Ibid., act i, sc. 5 (86). | | | (18) | Bastard. | I am amazed, methinks, and lose my way
Among the Thorns and dangers of this world. | | King John, act iv, sc. 3 (40). | | See also Rose, Nos. 7, 18, 22, 30, the scene in the Temple gardens; and Brier, No. 11. | Thorns and Thistles are the typical emblems of desolation and trouble, and so Shakespeare uses them; and had he spoken of Thorns in this sense only, I should have been doubtful as to admitting them among his other plants, but as in some of the passages they stand for the Hawthorn tree and the Rose bush, I could not pass them by altogether. They might need no further comment beyond referring for further information about them to Hawthorn, Briar, Rose, and Bramble; but in speaking of the Bramble I mentioned the curious legend which tells why the Bramble employs itself in collecting wool from every stray sheep, and there is another very curious instance in Blount's "Antient Tenures" of a connection between Thorns and wool. The original document is given in Latin, and is dated 39th Henry III. It may be thus translated: "Peter de Baldwyn holds in Combes, in the county of Surrey, by the service to go a wool gathering for our Lady the Queen among the White Thorns, and if he refuses to gather it he shall pay into the Treasury of our Lord the King xxs. per annum." I should almost suspect a false reading, as the editor is inclined to do, but that many other services, equally curious and improbable, may easily be found.
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