GRAMINEJE. 609 



Portuguese- Tlie former Is similar to the bread used in all 

 Mahometan countries, tlie latter is made with 60 parts fine 

 rawa, 20 second sort or )iaJ>:a raica, and 20 of first sort flour. 

 A second or inferior kind of bread is also sold. The barm 

 or yeast in use is, where obtainable, the fermenting juice of the 

 palm, elsewhere an artificial barm is prepared. 



In some of the large towns a loaf -bread is now made by 

 Brahmins for the use of the Hindu population, but its use is 

 very limited. In Calcutta, Madras, and Bombay, flour aud bread 

 made as in Europe is obtainable, and is gradually takiug the 

 place of the Portuguese article. Fine flour is also imported 



from Europe and America, as the excessive proportion of 

 gluten in Indian flour renders it unsuitable for use in making 

 pastry. 



Wheaten flour is often used as a dusting-powder to allay 

 the heat and pain of local inflammations, such as burns, scalds, 

 &c., but it is inferior for such purposes to powdered starch. 

 In America an uncooked paste made of the flour has been used 

 with success in diarrhava. In India flour is much used by the 

 natives for making poultices. 



Description.— The albumen which constitutes the main 

 portion of the grain is composed of large thin-walled parcn- 

 chyme, the cells of which on transverse section are seen ^ to 

 radiate from the furrow, and to be lengthened in that direction 

 rather than longitudinally. In the vicinity of the furrow alone 

 the tissue of the albumen is narrower. Its predominating 

 large cells show a polygonal or oval outline, whilst the outer 

 layer is built up of two, three or four rows of thick-walled, 

 coherent, nearly cubic gluten-cells. This layer, about /O mkm. 

 ttiek, is coated with an extremely thin brown tegument, to 

 which succeeds a layer about 30 mkm. thick, of densely packed, 

 tabular, grevish or yellowish cells of very small size ; this proper 

 coat of the fruit in "the furrow is of rather spongy appearance. 



The gluten-ceUs. varying considerably in the diiferent cereal 

 grains, afford characters enough to distinguish them with 

 certainty. In wheat, for instance, the gluten-cells are 



in a 



III -77 



