THE WILD PLANTS OF FOREIGN BARLEY FIELDS. Vi 
only of the smaller species. I shall dwell on them later in my 
paper. The pea family is well represented ; the most interesting 
species being Lathyrus aphaca with its pretty cordate, opposite 
leaves, and its small, yellow flowers. I have also found the seeds 
of the flax, asparagus, wild oat, thistles, poppies, and others which 
occur in our own barley. 
Austrian barleys are almost identical, with respect to the seeds 
they contain, with French barleys. Ranunculus arvensis would 
appear to be a very common weed from the number of its seeds 
which occur. 
In Smyrna barleys I have found many interesting and curious 
seeds, and have, fortunately, been able to cultivate most of them. 
One of the most common and, at the same time, one of the most 
striking seeds is a large prickly coiled pod which, on cultivation, 
turns out to be a member of the pea tribe ; it is, however, wanting 
in the general characteristic of that tribe—the habit of climbing, 
It is Scorpiurus sulcata, an ally of that pretty Zathyrus which we 
found in the French barley. 
It is here that we meet with the Medicagoes in their greatest 
beauty, so that I will now dwell on all the species I have come 
across. The fruits consist of many variations of a coiled pod, 
from a small, flat, compressed spiral to a large, ball-like spiral, 
covered with spines. Between these two extremes there exist many 
gradations ; thus, the fruit of one species is a small, rather flat 
spiral, of two or three rings, having the edges adorned with spines ; 
another has a larger spiral, with the spines absent ; while a similar 
sized spiral, having spines, exists. There is also a species with a 
very large, flat, compressed spiral, which is termed Medicago 
orbiculata ; in another species the outside edge of the smooth pod 
curves upwards, forming a cabbage-like spiral. This last species 
I have not succeeded in growing ; specimens of all the others are 
exhibited. To non-botanical eyes there seems to be no difference 
between the plants, and even to botanists it must be a matter of 
wonder that so small a difference in the structure of the plant 
should correspond to so great a difference in the fruit. I have 
also mounted a specimen of one of our own Medicagoes, in order 
