192 - BOTANICON SINICUM. 
Jap., 1725, Polypodium lineare, Thbg., EK #, $i) Ft. 
277; 45 lingua, Sw., A #, He JJ fi. 
ee ASS, ri vulgare, L , 7k BE - 
» 1794, Pteris aquilina, L., PR - | 
1799; 5, serruiata, L. f., IF ay 3% Hi, JAN Ez Hi. : 
» 2030, Scolopendrium vulgare, Sm., IK FH Al- 
» 2386, Woodwardia japonica, Sw., hy FF. ‘ a 
3¢8.—The 7% we’, mentioned together with the hie femin 
the Shi king [23, 358, 359] is called thorn fern by Leeee. — 
He relies for this identification upon Cau Hr, who says that 
the wei resembles the hie but that it is rather longer and has 
spmous points and a bitter taste. But CHu seems to be 
mistaken, for none of the earlier commentators on the Shi king fey 
ventured to refer the wei to a fern. Mao says simply 2 
it is a vegetable, the Rh ya [167] states only that it grows 
by the edge of the water; the Shuo wen says it is & — 
vegetable which resembles the ## ho [v. supra, 354], thus — 
it may be supposed that it is a jeguminous plant. ae 
Lu &1 states :—The wei is a mountain vegetable. It isa 
Creeper, in its stem and in the leaves it resembles the 7) cs : 
siao tou [ Phaseolus Mungo, v. supra, 355). It resembles this 
latter plant also in taste. The leaves are eaten both raw and 
cooked. Nowadays it is grown in the government’s gardens & 
and used at the sacrifices in the ancestral temple. . 
P., XXVIII, 26, describes the wei as a leguminous plant, S 
also called We Bye wan tou (wild pea) and eaten as a— | 
pot-herb, ee 
The drawing in Ch., IV, 19, representing the wei, is rude, 
only leaves which seem to refer to a leguminous plant. 
At Peking the name wei is applied to Vicia gigantea, Bge — 
The SF 0 H in the So moku [XUI, 12] is Lathyrus — 
maritimus, Bigel. a 
I may, however, observe that in Japan, the Chinese 
character #, in accordance with Cuu Hr’s view, is applied 
