WHEAT. 371) 



states* that in the champain country about 

 Byzacium in Africa, wheat had been known 

 to yield 150 fold. He informs us, that a 

 procurator-general of that province, under 

 Augustus Caesar, sent the emperor from 

 thence a plant of wheat which had near 400 

 straws springing from one grain, and meeting 

 all in one and the same root. Likewise one 

 was sent from the same country to the empe- 

 ror Nero, which had 340 straws, which all 

 sprang from one corn. But, he adds, to go 

 no farther than Sicily, within the territory 

 about Leontini, there have been certain fields 

 known wherein one grain has put forth 100 

 stalks with ears upon them ; and this, he says, 

 is ordinary throughout the kingdoms of 

 Granada and Andalusia in Spain. But, above 

 all, the land of Egypt boasts of rendering 

 great interest to the husbandmen. Of all the 

 kinds of wheat, says this author, these two 

 are in the greatest repute; viz. the one which 

 branches, and the other which is called Ccnti- 

 granum, or the wheat thatbeareth 100 grains. 

 The Greeks made great account of the 

 wheat which grew in Pontus. Italy soon be- 

 came famed for her wheat ; for we find it no- 



* Book xviii. chap. 10. 



