PLANTS MENTIONED IN CLASSICAL WORKS. 208 
K‘u kua is now the name applied in China as well as in 
Japan to Momordica charantia, . The fruit of this eucur- 
bitaceous plant is bitter and covered with little wart-like 
* protuberances, wherefore the Chinese call it also #K M 
lai kua (leprosy gourd). P., XXVIII, 21, Ch, V, 6, 
So moku, XX, 36. 
Ii Sut-cuen, however, does not mean to identify the k‘u hua 
~ of our days with that of the Shi king, proving that Momordica 
__ is not indigenous to China but was introduced from the south. 
LV .—Tevrtile Plants. 
388.—The character Jif ma, which nowadays is a generic 
term for plants yielding textile fibres, was in ancient times 
applied exclusively to the common hemp plant, Cannabis 
sativa, L. As is well-known, its flowers are of separate sexes 
on different plants. The male plant was called ee eee 
In the RA ya [104] this character is given as a synonym 
for” Jif. The male or seed-bearing plant was Jf, tsi. The 
Th ya [140] gives fi fen as a name tor hemp-seed. | 
The Lu shi [Sung dynasty] relates a tradition according to | 
— which the Emperor Suen xune [28th century B.C.] first 
a taught the people to cultivate the ma, or "hemp, and the 
- Mnulberry tree, for making hempen and silken cloth (4 pu 
= ond Hi, po). , 
The Rh yai [12th century] says the ma is -used for food 
[the seed] as well as for making cloth (4) from its fibres. — 
_ The plant which bears seed is called tsi, that whieh: has no 
= seed i is si. 
As hemp-see. 
times was reckoned | one of te five, or nine, kinds of 
8 grain [r, supra, soa] : 
