146 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 54 



Nicander, doubly distinguished himself in so doing; for Nicandra 

 not only commemorates a worthy name in old Greek plant lore, 

 but the type that was to bear the name was with an exquisite 

 sense of fitness chosen from out the family of the nightshades. 



Marcus Porcius Cato (b. c. 235-150). — An illustrious Roman 

 of vigorous mind and great originality, serving the public in the 

 most exalted and responsible offices with great acceptance, affluent 

 as to means, he lead a life of great simplicity, temperance, and 

 frugality, delighting in nothing else so much as the training of his 

 children in virtue, and cultivating flowers and fruits. Practically 

 a philosopher indeed himself, Cato held in abhorrence the philoso- 

 phies of the Greeks, was strongly averse to the introduction of Greek 

 art and Greek customs into Rome, apprehending the destruction 

 thereby of Roman valor and simplicity, and recalling his son from 

 the study of Greek. Later in life Cato must have fallen captive 

 to the charms of Greek erudition; for he himself mastered the 

 language, and on a visit to Athens addressed a concourse of the 

 people in their own tongue; and it is observed that his own writings 

 have quotations from Greek authors. 



The literary monument that immortalizes Cato the Censor is his 

 De Re Rusiica, a treatise on farming, gardening, fruit growing 

 etc. It is the oldest book of its kind in Latin literature, and therefore 

 is of botanical interest. We learn from its pages that almost every 

 method of propagating choice varieties in use with twentieth-century 

 pomologists and vineyardists was practised by Cato long before the 

 beginning of our era, even to the different modes of grafting; and 

 there is no intimation that any of those methods were other than 

 ancient at that time. The number of named varieties of things 

 which they had and were careful to perpetuate is also sufficiently 

 interesting to merit such exemplification as I here subjoin, culled 

 from Cato's book: 



Brassica crispa Myrtus alba. 



Brassica erratica Myrtus nigra 



Brassica lenis Myrtus conjugalis. 



Brassica laevis Ficus marisca. 



Olea albiceris Ficus Africana. 



Olea Colminiana Ficus Herculana. 



Olea conditiva Ficus hibema. 



Olea Liciniana Ficus Saguntina. 



Olea Salentina Ficus Telana atra. 



Olea Sergiana Vitis aminea majuscula. 



