654 



SEC 



THE UNIVERSAL HERBAL; 



SEC 



tinguish this genus from Triticum. ESSENTIAL CHARACTER. 

 Calix : two-valved, solitary, two-flowered, on a toothed elon- 

 gated receptacle. The species are, 



1. Secale Cereale ; Rye. Ciliae of the glumes rugged. 

 Root annual ; stem higher and weaker than Wheat, sometimes 

 attaining the height of six feet ; leaves a quarter or a third 

 of an inch in breadth, rough to the touch if the finger be 

 drawn from point to base, but not hairy : they are wider, and 

 form a more considerable tuft, than Wheat commonly does. 

 Spike very close, of a gray colour from its pubescence, in 

 a good soil and situation having four rows, containing from 

 sixty to eighty, and sometimes 120 grains, smaller and slen- 

 derer than Wheat. Rye is esteemed the least nourishing of 

 all the common grains : it is more susceptible of fermentation, 

 and in a slight degree laxative. It is used principally for 

 making bread in our northern counties, either alone or mixed 

 with wheat; and also for extracting an ardent spirit. In the 

 Limosin, a province of France, it is used with great success 

 for fattening oxen, after they have had a summer's grass, 

 and have been put to Turnips, at the end of October or the 

 beginning of November. When the Turnips fail, they mix 

 the flour with water to the consistency of a paste, and lea-ve 

 it three, four, or five days, to ferment and become sour ; they 

 then dilute it with water, and add cut hay to the whole. 

 Some mix leaven with the paste, to secure a fermentation ; 

 but it is never used till quite sour. The cattle have it three 

 times a day ; twenty-Wo pounds for each large ox. Some 

 say that Rye is a native of Crete, and others of Siberia; but 

 there is no reason to think that there is any country in which 

 it is found wild. It flowers in June, and the grain is ripe in 

 England about the middle of July. Farmers distinguish the 

 two varieties by the titles of Winter and Spring Rye, but when 

 these are sown three or four years at the same season, and 

 on the same soil, it will be difficult to know them asunder. 

 Where Rye is sown upon a warm land, it will ripen much 

 earlier than upon cold stiff ground, and by continuing it 

 for two or three years, it will be forwarded so much, as to 

 ripen a month earlier than the seeds which have long grown 

 upon a strong cold soil ; so those who are obliged to sow 

 Rye toward spring, generally provide themselves with this 

 early seed. The Common or Winter Rye is what most farmers 

 grow : it is usually sown at the same time as Wheat, and 

 mixed with it in many of the northern counties. This mixture 

 however is bad husbandry, as the Rye will always ripen 

 sooner than Wheat; so that if the latter be permitted to be 

 fully ripe, the former will shatter. It is generally sown two 

 bushels and a half to the acre, upon poor dry gravelly or 

 sandy land, where Wheat will not thrive, and may answer very 

 well in such places, but should not be grown where the land 

 will bear Wheat, as the value of Rye is greatly inferior. When 

 it is sown, the ground should not be too wet; and if much 

 rain should fall before it comes up, it will probably rot in the 

 ground, but will not be long in making its appearance, being 

 much sooner out of the ground than Wheat. The small Rye 

 may be sown in the spring, about the same time as Oats, and 

 is usually ripe as soon as the other sort; but in wet seasons 

 it is apt to run mnch to straw, and then the grain is generally 

 lighter than the other ; so the only use of this sort is to sow 

 upon lands where the autumnal crop may have miscarried. 

 It is also town in autumn, to afford green feed for ewes and 

 lambs in the spring 1 , before there is plenty of grass. This 

 should be done early in autumn, that it may have strength 

 to furnish early seed. Its great use is to supply the want of 

 Turnips where tlv:v have failed, as also after the Turnips are 

 over, and before the grass is enough grown to afford green 

 feed for the ewes ; hence, in those cold seasons, when the 



Turnips in general fail, it is very good husbandry to sow the 

 land with Rye, especially where there are flocks of sheep, 

 which cannot well be supported early in the spring when 

 green feed is wanting: therefore those farmers who have 

 large live-stocks, should have several methods of supplying 

 themselves with sufficient feed, lest some should fail, for as 

 Turnips are a very precarious crop, some land should be 

 sown with Cole-seed, which will supply the want of Turnips 

 i-n winter; and if some of the ground, which was sown late 

 with Turnips that failed, was sown in the autumn with Rye, 

 that would be fit to supply the want of Cole-seed afterward. 

 Spring Rye produces a less crop of smaller lighter grain than 

 Winter Rye; it is also esteemed less nourishing, and the 

 bread made of it is of a darker colour. Asa grain, for making 

 bread, Rye is sown to a much greater extent in Germany, 

 Switzerland, and the northern and Alpine countries, than in 

 England. In cold and moist valleys among the mountains, 

 it is their most useful crop, and in many places the chief 

 resource of the hardy inhabitants. 



2. Secale Villosum ; Villose Rye Grass. Ciliae of the 

 glumes villose; calicine scales wedge-shaped. This annual 

 Grass is a native of the south of Europe, and the Levant. 



3. Secale Orientale; Oriental Rye Grass. Glumes hirsute; 

 calicine scales awl-shaped. -Native of the Archipelago. 



4. Secale Creticum ; Cretan Rye Grass. Glumes ciliate 

 on the outside. Native of Candia or Crete. 



Sechium; a genus of the class Monoecia, order Monadelphia. 

 GENERIC CHARACTER. Male Flowers. Calix : perianth 

 one-leafed, half five-cleft; tube bell-shaped, spreading; seg- 

 ments of the border lanceolate, flat, acuminate, spreading 

 very much. Corolla : one-petalled ; tube the size and figure 

 of the calix, adhering to it ; segments of the border five-cleft, 

 ovate, flat, acute, spreading, nearly twice as long as the 

 calix. Nectary ten hollows in the upper part of the tube of 

 the corolla. Stamina: filamenta five, connected into an up- 

 right cylinder, five-cleft at. top, spreading very much ; antherse 

 on the top of each filamentum a line, creeping twice down- 

 wards, and once upwards, polliniferous. Females on the 

 same plant. Calix: as in the male, placed on the germen by 

 a pedicel, deciduous. Corolla : as in the male, but the hol- 

 lows or pits bigger. Pistil: gennen obovate, tomentose, five- 

 grooved, superior; style cylindrical, erect, length of the 

 calix; stigma very large, peltate, reflexed, with the margin 

 five-cleft. Pericarp: apple very large, ovate, turbinate, five- 

 grooved, fleshy, unequally gibbous at the top, furnished 

 with harmless prickles, one-celled above. Seed : one, sub- 

 ovate, piano-compressed, fleshy, bilamellate, blunt at each 

 end. ESSENTIAL CHARACTER. Male. Calix: half five-cleft. 

 Corolla : five-cleft, with ten hollows in the upper part of the 

 tube. Filcanenta: five, connected. Female. Stigma : very 

 large, peltate, reflexed, five-cleft. Pericarp: large, ovate- 

 turbinate, one-seeded. The single species known is, 



1. Sechium Edule ; The Chocho Vine. Stem herbaceous, 

 climbing or procumbent, greatly divaricated, roundish, stri- 

 ated, smooth, thick; leaves cordate-angular, rugged on the 

 upper surface, with the angles toothed and acute, alternate, 

 on a smooth petiole ; flowers small, without scent; corollas 

 yellow. The fruit is green and shining on the outside, white 

 and fleshy within, differing in size, and singular in structure. 

 Although the moisture of the fruit itself be sufficient to make 

 the seed vegetate, and to afford it nutriment, until the fibres 

 reach the soil, and imbibe nutriment from thence ; yet the 

 people of the country bury it in the ground, probably to 

 accelerate the growth, or to insure it with greater certainty ; 

 it will however grow if it fall on the ground, or even if it be 

 preserved any where. In the island of Cuba, they eat it in 



