“ Other species of foxglove with variously coloured flowers have been introduced into Britain from the continent of Europe. The plants may be propagated by unflowered off-sets from the roots, but being biennials are best raised from seed.
The foxglove, probably from folks’-glove, that is fairies’ glove, is known by a great variety of popular names in Britain. In the south of Scotland it is called bloody fingers; farther north, dead-men’s-bells; and on the eastern borders, ladies’ thimbles, wild mercury and Scotch mercury. In Ireland it is generally known under the name of fairy thimble. ”

“ The characters of the plant are as follows: stem erect, roundish, downy, leafy below, and from 18 in. to 5 ft. or more in height; leaves alternate, crenate, rugose, ovate or elliptic oblong, and of a dull green, with the under surface downy and paler than the upper; radical leaves together with their stalks often a foot in length; root of numerous, slender, whitish fibres ”