Chap. 21.] WHEAT Itf AFRICA. 35 



of its always having the ear upright, and not retaining the 

 dew, which is a prolific cause of mildew. 



From arinca 93 a bread of remarkable sweetness is made. 

 The grains in this variety lie closer than they do in spelt ; the 

 ear, too, is larger and more weighty. It is rarely the case 

 that a modius of this grain does not weigh full sixteen pounds. 

 In Greece they find great difficulty in threshing it ; and hence 

 it is that we find Homer 94 saying that it is given to beasts of 

 burden, this being the same as the grain that he calls " olyra." 

 In Egypt it is threshed without any difficulty, and is remark- 

 ably prolific. Spelt has no beard, and the same is the case 

 with winter wheat, except 95 that known as the Laconian 

 variety. To the kinds already mentioned we have to add 

 bromos, 96 the winter wheat just excepted, and tragos, 97 all of 

 them exotics introduced from the East, and very similar to 

 rice. Tiphe 98 also belongs to the same class, from which in 

 our part of the world a cleaned grain resembling rice is pre- 

 pared. Among the Greeks, too > there is the grain known 

 as zea ; and it is said that this, as well as tiphe, when cleaned 

 from the husk and sown, will degenerate 99 and assume the 

 form of wheat ; not immediately, . but in the course of three 

 years. 



CHAP. 21. THE FRUITFTJLNESS OF AFRICA Itf WHEAT. 



There is no grain more prolific than wheat, Nature having 

 bestowed upon it this quality, as being the substance which she 

 destined for the principal nutriment of man. A modius of 



93 Fee has no doubt that this was siligo, or winter- wheat, in a very 

 high state of cultivation. 

 <" II. v. 1. 195. 



95 There are still some varieties both of whiter-wheat and spelt that 

 have the beard. 



96 It is generally thought that this is the oat, the Avena sativa of Lin- 

 naeus, while some have suggested rice. Fee thinks that by the name, 

 some exotic gramineous plant is meant. 



97 Probably a variety of spelt, as Sprengel conjectures, from Galen and 

 other writers. See c. 1 6 of this Book. 



* Fee thinks that it is the grain of the Festuca fluitans of Linnasus 

 that is here alluded to, and identifies it with the " ulva palustris" of Virgil, 

 Geor. Hi. 174. 



99 The Latin word "degener" cannot here mean "degenerate, in our 

 sense of the word, but must merely imply a change of nature in the plant. 



D 2 



