89 



" Do'n t-siol chruithneachd, chuireadh gu tiugh ; 

 Cha b' e' n fhiteag, no' n coirc diibh^ — M 'Donald. 



When oats become black with blight, the name coirc djibh is 

 applied, but especially to the variety called Avena strigosa. 



Hordeum distichon — Barley ; the kind which is in common 

 cultivation. (" Barley " comes from Celtic bar^ bread, now 

 obsolete in Gaelic, but still retained in Welsh — hence barn^ 

 and by the change of the vowel, beer.) Gaelic and Irish : eoma^ 

 or?ia. Irish : earfi (perhaps from Latin, horreo^ to bristle ; 

 Gaelic, or^ a beard) — O'Reilly. " The bearded or bristly bar- 

 ley ; " " orog^'^ a sheaf of corn. Hordeum, sometimes written 

 ordeum (Freund), is from the same root. " It was cultivated 

 by the Romans for horses, and also for the army ; and gladia- 

 tors in training were fed with it, and hence called hordiarii." 

 It is still used largely in the Highlands for bread, but was for- 

 merly made into " crowdie," properly corrody, from Low Latin, 

 corrodiiun, a worry. 



" Fuarag eorn ann' sail mo bhroge, 

 Biadli a b' f hearr a f huir mi riamh. " 



Barley-crowdie in my shoe, 

 The sweetest food I ever knew. 



Irish : cameog, oats and barley — from cain (Greek, Krjvao^ ; Latin, 

 ce?isus), rent, tribute. Rents were frequently paid in " kind," 

 instead of in money. 



Secale cereale — Common rye. Gaelic and Irish : seagall. 

 Greek : o-exaXr]. Armoric : sega/. French : se/g/e. 

 " An cruithneach agus an seagall." — Exodus. 

 The wheat and the rye. 

 Welsh : r/iyg, rye. 



Molinia cserulea — Purple melic- grass. Gaelic: bunglds 

 (M'Donald), pimglds. {Bun, a root, a stack ; glas, blue.) The 

 fishermen round the west coast and in Skye make ropes for their 

 nets of this grass, which they find by experience will bear the 

 water well without rotting. Irish : mealoigfer corcuir (O'Reilly), 

 — mealoig ~ ?nelic (from 7?iel, honey), the pith is like honey; 

 fer or feur, grass ; corcuir, crimson or purplish. In some 

 parts of the Highlands the plant is called braba?i (Stewart.) 



Glyceria. — From Greek, yXvKvs, sweet, in allusion to the 

 foliage. 



G. fluitans — Floating sweet grass. Milsean nisge, inillteach 

 uisge, — perhaps from viillse, sweetness. Horses, cattle, and 

 swine are fond of this grass, which only grows in watery places. 



