HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



35 



for walking, but stretched out backwards, their ex- 

 treme ends bent inwards, and, as far as I could make 

 out, not furnished with claws. Their gait was ex- 

 tremely awkward. In certain Dermaleichi, found on 

 small birds, the males have one of the hind pairs of 

 legs very largely and peculiarly developed, but in 

 their case it is the third, the fourth pair being very 

 small, and used in walking. 



Fig. 21. Male of White Mite. 



Fig. 22. Female of White Mite. 



About the middle of August I again visited this 

 tree, and found upon and with the White Mites a 

 number of Hypopi, but whether these were parasitic 

 on the White Mites, or merely residing with them, 

 I was not able to determine. I passed this tree 

 on several occasions during the summer, and fre- 

 quently saw Wasps and Red Admiral Butterflies 

 enjoying the sap, which kept some parts of the 

 tree continually moist. The figures are all drawn 

 from mounted specimens under a §° object-glass, 



Fig. 23. Young of 

 "White Mite. 



Fig. 24. Hyjiopus found 

 with White Mites. 



with A eyepiece, and are magnified about 72 

 diameters. 



Kirton Lindscy. C. F. GEORGE. 



THE HISTORY OF OUR SALAD HERBS. 

 Part III. — Mustard. 



MUSTARD was, according to the belief of the 

 ancients, first introduced from Egypt, that 

 country which claims the honour of being the birth- 

 place of Ceres, the goddess of seeds, and ^Esculapius, 

 the god of medicine, through whose means this plant 

 was made known to mankind as an agreeable and 

 wholesome herb in its green state ; while the seed 

 was used as a medicine, and occupied the first rank 

 among alimentary substances which exercised a 

 prompt influence on the brain. Mustard is mentioned 

 by Pythagoras, and was employed in medicine by 

 Hippocrates, B.C. 480. Pliny states that there were 

 three kinds of mustard cultivated in his day ; the first 

 of a thin and slender form, the second with a leaf 

 like that of the rape, and the third with that like the 

 rocket. The best seed, he says, was imported from 

 Egypt, but that this plant grew in Italy without 

 sowing. The Romans made great use of the seed in 

 medicine ; the oil extracted from it, mixed with olive 

 oil, was used by those who suffered with stiffness of 

 their limbs after a cold bath. Pounded with vinegar 

 it was employed as a liniment for the sting of serpents 

 and scorpions, and a dose of it effectually neutralized 

 the poisonous properties of fungi. The Romans, and 

 other nations after them, used to ferment mustard- 

 seed in new wine, which converted it into a kind of 

 inferior brandy, and was known by the name of 

 Must urn aniens, burning wine. 



The mustard-seed mentioned in the Scripture has 

 of late years been a matter of considerable controversy, 

 some authors supposing it to be quite a different 

 plant from the one we are now treating of ; but it is 

 generally believed by the best authorities in the 

 present day that the plant referred to was Sinapis 

 nigra, the common mustard, which is indigenous to 

 Palestine, as it is to Britain. Dr. Thompson, in his 

 " Land and the Book," records that he has seen 

 this plant as tall as the horse and his rider in the rich 

 plains of Acre. 



