A timely and light-hearted offering from the Laudator:
Oliver Rackham, The History of the Countryside (1986; rpt. London: Phoenix Press, 2000), p. 295:
Furze is an important and widely-used fuel; it produces a quick hot blaze suitable for heating ovens, getting up a fire in the morning, or burning heretics.
Also known as gorse or whin. It is very spiny – probably useful in producing a hot blaze for heretics – if the heat doesn’t get them, the thorns will!!
Nice, I had no idea! Is there a stockpile building up? We’re gonna need it.
Seriously, I’m praying for the salvation of souls and the conversion of sinners. Myself included.
Bringing Burning at the Stake back in vogue!
Re-activate the Order of Preachers. They’re facing pending worldwide deployment!
“What a day, what a day, for an Auto de fe”.
The passage doesn’t mention it, but it is a shrub. It is mentioned several times in Christina Rossetti’s “The Goblin Market”.
I’ll take several gallons. I need some high octane Furze for some pro-abortion, feminazi, dissenting religious type heretics.