ENQUIRY INTO PLANTS, VI. m. 1-3 



as it were, 1 and is called the phyllon. The stalk 

 lasts only a year, like that of ferula. Now in 

 spring it sends up this maspelon, which purges sheep 

 and greatly fattens them, and makes their flesh 

 wonderfully delicious ; after that it sends up a stalk, 

 which 2 is eaten, it is said, in all ways, boiled and 

 roast, and this too, they say, purges the body in 

 forty days. It has two kinds of juice, one from the 

 stalk and one from the root ; wherefore the one is 

 called ' stalk-juice,' the other 'root-juice.' The 

 root has a black bark, which is stripped off. They 

 have regulations, like those in use in mines, 3 for 

 cutting the root, in accordance with which they fix 

 carefully the proper amount to be cut, having regard 

 to previous cuttings and the supply of the plant. 

 For it is not allowed to cut it wrong nor to cut more 

 than the appointed amount ; for, if the juice is kept 

 and not used, it goes bad and decays. When they are 

 conveying it to Peiraeus, they deal with it thus 4 : 

 having put it in vessels and mixed meal with it, they 

 shake it for a considerable time, and from this 

 process it gets its colour, and this treatment 5 makes 

 it thenceforward keep without decaying. Such 

 are the facts in regard to the cutting and treatment. 

 The plant is found over a wide tract of Libya, for 

 a distance, 6 they say, of more than four thousand 

 furlongs, but it is most abundant 7 near the Syrtis, 

 starting from the Euesperides islands. It is a 

 peculiarity of it that it avoids cultivated ground, and, 

 as the land is brought under cultivation and tamed, 



6 fpya<r6fv : f^opyaffOfv conj. Salm.; from Pliu. I.e., argu- 

 ment um era/, maturitatis color siccilasque sudore finito. 



6 c/. Strabo 2. 5. 20 ; 17. 3. 20 : Scyl. Feriplus, Libya. 



7 TrAeto-Ta conj.W. ; 7rAiofaU; ra -nXfiova. MAlcl. ; yivtaBai 

 conj.W.; yfvea&at Aid. 



17 



VOL. ii. r 



