144 pliny's NATURAL HISTORY. [Book XII. 



CHAP. 48. THE SWEET-SCENTED CALAMUS; 59 THE SAVEET- SCENTED 



RUSH. 



Scented calamus also, which grows in Arabia, is common to 

 both India and Syria, that which grows in the last country 

 being superior to all the rest. At a distance of one hundred 

 and fifty stadia from the Mediterranean, between Mount 

 Libanus and another mountain of no note (and not, as some 

 have supposed, Antilibanus), there is a valley of moderate 

 size, situate in the vicinity of a lake, the marshy swamps of 

 which are dried up every summer. At a distance of thirty 

 stadia from this lake grow the sweet-scented calamus and 

 rush. We shall here make some further mention of this rush 

 as well, although we have set apart another Book for plants 

 of that description, seeing that it is our object here to de- 

 scribe all the different materials used for unguents. These 

 plants differ in appearance in no respect from others of their 

 kind ; but the calamus, which has the more agreeable smell of 

 the two, attracts by its odour at a considerable distance, and 

 is softer to the touch than the other. The best is the kind 

 which is not so brittle, but breaks into long flakes, and not 

 short, like a radish. In the hollow stalk there is a substance 

 like a cobweb, which is generally known by the name of the 

 " flower:" those plants which contain the most of it are 

 esteemed the best. The other tests of its goodness are its 

 being of a black colour— those which are white not being 

 esteemed ; besides which, to be of the very best quality it 

 should be short, thick, and pliant when broken. The price of 

 the scented calamus is eleven, and of the rush fifteen denarii 

 per pound. It is said that the sweet-scented rush is to be met 

 with also in Campania. 



CHAP. 49. HAMMONIACUM. 



"We have now departed from the lands which look towards 

 59 Fee remarks, that this must not be confounded with the Calamus 

 aromaticus of the moderns, of which Pliny speaks in B. xxv. c. 100, with 

 sufficient accuracy to enable us to identify it with the Acorus calamus of 

 Linnaeus. It is not ascertained by naturalists what plant is meant by 

 Pliny in the present instance, though Fee is of opinion that a gramineous 

 plant of the genus Andropogon is meant. M. Guibourt has suggested that 

 the Indian Gentiana chirayta is the plant. From what Pliny says in B. 

 xiii. c. 21, it appears that this calamus grew in Syria, which is also the 

 native country of the Andropogon schcenanthus. 



