The Haricot-Weevil 



but how are we to know? Haricot, fantastic 

 haricot, you set us a curious linguistic 

 problem. 



The Frenchman calls it also faseole, 

 flageolet. The Provencal dubs it fa'iou and 

 / avion-, the Catalan fayol; the Spaniard 

 faseolo; the Portuguese feydo; the Italian 

 faguilo. Here I am on familiar ground: 

 the languages of the Latin family have kept, 

 with the inevitable terminal modifications, 

 the ancient word faseolus. 



Now, if I consult my dictionary, I find: 

 faselus, phaselus, faseolus, phaseolus, 

 haricot. Learned vocabulary, permit me to 

 tell you that your translation is wrong: 

 phaselus or phaseolus cannot mean haricot. 

 And the incontestable proof is in the 

 Georgics* where Virgil tells us the season 

 at which to sow the faseolus. He says: 



Si vero viciamque seres vilemque phaselum. . . . 

 Hand obscura cadens mittet tib'i signa Bootes; 2 

 Incipe et ad medias sementem extende pruinas. 



1 Book L, line 227 et seq. Author's Note. 



2 "Vile vetches would you sow, or lentils lean? 



The growth of Egypt, or the kidney-bean? 

 Begin when the slow Waggoner descends, 

 Nor cease your sowing till mid-winter ends." 

 Dryden's translation. 

 273 



