189 PLINY'S NATFBAL HISTOET. [Book XIX. 



dry places, we find growing the kind known as "hipposeli- 

 num," 93 consisting of numerous leaves, similar to helioselmum 

 A third variety is the oreoselinum, 9i with leaves like those 

 hemlock, and a thin, fine, root, the seed being similar to that 

 of -anise, only somewhat smaller. 



The differences,- again, that are found to exist in cultivated 

 parsley, 95 consist in the comparative density of the leaves, the 

 crispness or smoothness of their edges, and the thinness or 

 thickness of the stem, as the case may be : in some kinds, again, 

 the stem is white, in others purple, and in others mottled. 



CHAP. 38. THE NATTJKE AND VAETETIES OF TWENTY-THREE 

 GARDEN PLANTS. THE LETTUCE ; ITS DIFFERENT VARIETIES. 



The Greeks have distinguished three varieties of the lettuce ; 96 

 the first with a stalk so large, that small garden gates, 97 it is 

 said, have been made of it : the leaf of this lettuce is some- 

 what larger than that of the herbaceous, or green lettuce, but 

 extremely narrow, the nutriment seeming to be expended on 

 the other parts of the plant. The second kind is that with a 

 rounded 98 stalk ; and the third is the low, squat lettuce, 90 gene- 

 rally known as the Laconian lettuce. 



"thinly covered with leaves," and not jiotxtyvXAov, "having a single 

 leaf." Palladius (In Aprili.) translates it, " molli folio," "with a sott 

 leaf'" but, though Fee commends this version, it is not correct. 



93 Or " horse-parsley." Hardouin takes this to be Macedonian parsley, 

 the Buhon Macedonicum of Linnaeus. Fee, following C. Bauhin and 

 Sprengcl, is inclined to identify it with Macerona, the Smyr.nium t olusa- 

 trum of Linnaeus. 



94 Or "mountain-parsley." Probahly the Athamanta oreoselir 

 Linnrcus. Some commentators, however, take it to be the Laserpitium 

 formosum of Wilidenow. Sprengel identifies it with the Selmum oreose- 

 linum of Linnaeus. 



95 The Apium petroselinum, probably, of Lmnseus. 



96 The Lactuca sativa of Linnaeus. This account of the Greek varieties 

 is from Theophrastus, Hist. Plant. B. vii. c. 4. 



7 This, no doubt, is fabulous, and on a par with the Greek trad 

 that Adonis concealed himself under the leaves of a lettuce, when he was 

 attacked and killed by the wild boar. The Coss, or Roman, lettuce, as 

 Fee remarks, is the largest of all, and that never exceeds fifteen to twenty 

 inches i* height, leaves, stalk and all. 



s This would seem not to be a distinct variety, as the rounded stalk is 

 a characteristic of them all. 



x> Sessile." A cabbage-lettuce, probably ; though Hardouin disse 

 from that opinion. 



