PLANTS MENTIONED IN CLASSICAL WORKS. 217 
seed is #7. In the centre of the seed there is a small green 
hook (the plumule) which is called 7 and is very bitter, 
whence the proverb “ bitter as a plumule of the. Lotus-seed.” 
In the fifth month the seeds begin to form. The unripe 
tender seeds are eaten. In autumn the len or receptacle is 
getting black, and then the ripe seeds are ground into 
meal, which is used for food like millet. It is nourishing, 
strengthens the body. It is also eaten boiled into gruel. 
It is especially useful to the people of py J}] Yu chou 
(Northern Chili), #3 J Yang chou (Anhui, Chekiang), and 
HRM Yi chou (Honan), in time of dearth. The root 
stock is called ow. In Yi chou the people call it 3B 
kuang p‘ang ; it is shining like an ox-horn. _ 
Li sao, 19 :—J’ai séché des feuilles du nénuphar (ff) pour 
orner mes vétements supérieurs, j'ai amass¢é des fleurs 
WAlthea (3 #8) pour orner mes vétements inférieurs. 
I may observe that fw yung in ancient times was not Althzea 
but another name for the Lotus Hower [v. supra, 99, 101). 
Nelumbium speciosum is extensively cultivated throughout 
the Chinese Empire. At Peking the people eat the fresh 
seeds and cook the arrowroot obtained from the root o— 
ito a jelly which is considered very wholesome. : 
Of the ancient terms applied to the plant and parts of it, 
only three are still in use. The flowers are called 3# ria 
lien hua, the leaves Fif HB ho ye, the root stock is # ov, the 
flour obtained from it HE Pp ow fen. 
_ P.XXXIIL, 16, lien ow. The plant is figured under the same 
“name in Ch. XXXII, 9, and in the Kiu huang, LVUL, 7 
— Amen. exot., 880, 3g ren. Nymphea indica, sive Faba 
— Syptiaca Prosp. Alp. Planta paganis sacra... - Radix 
_prelonga, in transversum extensa, brachii crassitie, eX longis- 
intervallis geniculata. SrepoLp, Syn plant. econ. jap, 96, 
Nelumbium speciosuni, #8. Flos idolis oblatus. Radices cre- 
bram obsonium. Semina edulia.—So moku, X, 9, i 
