384 ORIGIN OF CULTIVATED PLANTS. 



panicles, mentioned by Roxburgh, and which Prosper 

 Alpin had seen in Egypt; hicolor, which in height re- 

 sembles the saccharatus ; and niger and ruhens, which 

 also seem to be varieties of cultivation. None of these 

 has been found wild, and it is probable that a monograph 

 would connect them with one or other of the above- 

 mentioned species. 



Coracan — Eleusine coracana, Gsertner. 



This annual grass, which resembles the millets, is cul- 

 tivated especially in India and the Malay Archipelago. 

 It is also grown in Egypt ^ and in Abyssinia ; ^ but the 

 silence of many botanists, who have mentioned the plants 

 of the interior and west of Africa, shows that its cultiva- 

 tion is not widely spread on that continent. In Japan ^ 

 it sometimes escapes from cultivation. The seeds will 

 ripen in the south of Europe, but the plant is valueless 

 there except as fodder.* 



No author mentions having found it in a wild state 

 in Asia or in Africa. Roxburgh,^ who is attentive to 

 such matters, after speaking of its cultivation, adds, 

 " I never saw it wild." He distinguishes under the 

 name Eleusine stricta a form even more commonly 

 cultivated in India, which appears to be simply a variety 

 of E. coracana, and which also he has not found 

 uncultivated. 



We shall discover its country by other means. 



In the first place, the species of the genus Eleusine are 

 more numerous in the south of Asia than in other 

 tropical regions. Besides the cultivated plant, Royle ^ 

 mentions other species, of which the poorer natives of 

 India gather the seeds in the plains. According to 

 Piddington's Index, there is a Sanskrit name, rajika, and 

 several other names in the modern languages of India. 

 That of coracana comes from an old name used in Ceylon, 

 houraMian? In the Malay Archipelago the names 

 appear less numerous and less original. 



^ Schweinfurth and Ascherson, Aufzahlung, p. 299. 



^ Bon Jardinier, 1880, p. 585. 



' Franchefc and Savatier, Enum. Plant. Japon., ii. p. 172. 



* Bon Jardinier. ibid. ^ Ex)xburgh, Fl. Indica, edit. 2, vol. i. p. 343. 



^ Royle, III. Him. Plants. '' Thwaites, Enum. PI. Zeylan., p. 371. 



