44 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 
removal from a mummy case 2,600 years old. The particular 
Mummy was one presented to John Macgregor about 1870 by 
the Khedive of Egypt. When the mummy reached England 
the case was opened in the presence of creditable witnesses 
and in the dust at the bottom were found 4 oat seed. Two 
of these were sown by Macgregor and 2 turned over to the 
Royal Botanic Society of London for planting. All 4 seed 
germinated, and, because of the care with which the mummy 
case had been opened and the connection of the Royal Botanic 
Society with the growing of the seedlings, the case was re- 
garded as absolutely authentic. While it seemed odd that 
only 4 seed were found and that these were precisely similar 
to varieties then in cultivation, no doubt was cast upon the 
truth of the incident until a long time afterward. It then 
developed that this identical mummy had been stored with 
others in the stables of the Khedive where fodder, including 
oats, was kept for the horses. The Khedive was in the habit 
of keeping on hand in his stables a stock of these most inter- 
esting products of his country, so that they would be ready 
at any time to present to distinguished visitors. It was shown 
that the dry air of the stable, together with rough usage, 
either warped and split the wood of the case or caused the 
elay luting which joined the two halves of the case to fall 
out, thus forming an opening through which the oats filtered 
in. There is no doubt that, for the purpose of deceiving credu- 
lous tourists, modern wheat or oats grains appropriately 
stained have sometimes been mixed with wheat taken from 
ancient vases and mummy eases and sold as “mummy wheat.’’ 
Genuine vases, apparently unopened, but containing such 
grains, are also occasionally sold to travelers. 
While the power which many seeds and spores possess of 
retaining their vitality under the most adverse conditions 
is one of the most interesting phenomena connected with 
plant life, it is only recently that there has been made available 
any trustworthy data upon the maximum life of a seed. In 
1907 Beequerel tested the germination of about 500 kinds of 
seed which had been preserved in the Natural History Museum 
of Paris. The age of these seed could be definitely determined, 
varying from 25 to 135 years, but the oldest seed (Cassia 
bicapsularis) which Beequerel succeeded in germinating was 
87 years old. In the following year Ewart published a list 
of over 4,000 varieties of seed which had been germinated 
