A DATE FAMINE, 161 
here, in entering, she rubs her dust-covered coat 
upon this organ, overlaying it with the very 
powder which is requisite for it. 
When the wind is the pollen-carrier, it is in 
consequence of the pollen- grains being so light 
as to float upon a gentle breeze, and they are 
thus conveyed to their proper destination. 
Sometimes, however, man is the instrument. 
The Date-palm is just one of those trees in which 
the flowers are either of one kind or of the other, 
and unless the pollen-grains of the one are in 
some manner or other conveyed to the flowers of 
the other, no dates would be produced ; for, as we 
have just remarked, the seed will not ripen unless 
this is the case. Now a failure of the Date-har- 
vest would be, to the inhabitants of Lower Egypt, 
as serious a calamity as the failure of our Wheat- 
crops to us, since they subsist mainly on this 
fruit. They therefore go and pluck the flowers 
bearing pollen, and climbing the trees of the oppo- 
site kind, sprinkle the yellow dust over the flowers 
which possess stigmas. After this, they are toler- 
ably sure of a fruitful harvest. In the year 1800, 
when the French armies invaded that country, 
the wretched natives fled away in all directions, 
M 
