LILIAOE^. 479 



of small asphodel-like flowers having a delicate purplish-blue 

 tinge, and a bloom like that of the Auricula. This plant is 

 very common in the Concan, and comes into blosaom in June, 

 immediately after the first fall of rain* 



ASPHODELUS FISTULOSUS, Linn. 



'Pig.— -Wight Ic, t. 2062; SiUh. FL Gt\, t. 335. 



Hab. — Kortliern India> Afglianistaiik The seeds. 

 Vernacular. — Piazi, Bokhat, Binghar-bij {Punjab^ Sind). 



History, Uses, &C. — TheplanthasareputationinSind 

 and the Punjab as a diuretic, and the seeds are sold in the shops ; 



•-• -. -•.* ■»- - -IT .TIT T» 



cultivated 



m 



Southern Afghanistan. (Murray.) Sibthorp describes it as 

 common near Athens. In Northern India and Afghanistan it is 

 eaten as a vegetable. Hesiod, who wrote about 800 B. C.^ 

 when he enjoins temperance and simplicity of living in his 

 "Works and Days/' says (ver. 30) : 



vf}7noi. ovbi X(Taa'ti>j o&<o ttK^ov ^fiKTV Travroff 

 ovS' b&ov iv iiakaxT] re via\ d(7^oS/ Xcouey &P€tap, 



How much is the half better than the whole ! How great a 

 blessing is there in Mallows and Asphodel ! Theophrastus, 

 in his History of Plants (vii., 11), tells us that Asphodel 

 roots were eaten by the Greeks, and an Asphodel is described 

 by Dioscorides* as a medicinal plant having diuretic and 

 deobstruent properties when given internally, and being useful 

 as an external application to ulcers and inflamed parts, &c. The 

 Romans called the same plant ^Jlastida re(jla^ or king*s spear, 

 and used it as a remedy for morbus regiils or Urepos (cl JTy^j?. de 

 MorhiSy ii., 35). Arabic and Persian writers on Materia Medica 

 describe an Asphodel with white flowers under the name of 

 Khunsa (^^ii^), the same, or a very similar plant, is called 



' Diosc, ii., 159. The Anthericoa of Theophrastus was probably the 

 Yellow Asphodel, In Western and Qo\xt\iQni\nAiVi Aidhericum tuberosum, 

 Roxb-, is in common use as a vegetable, boiling appears to remove the acrid 

 properties of these plants. 



