140 WILD FLOWERS. 



tity of onions consumed by the workmen in the 

 building of the Great Pyramid. 



In somewhat more modern days Major Denham, 

 during his route south from Bornou, observed the 

 frequent occurrence of gardens, in which, however, 

 no vegetable except onions appeared to be culti- 

 vated, a circumstance which recalls to us the asser- 

 tion of Woolidge, that he had seen gardens in Wales, 

 the greater part of which were planted with leeks, 

 while a portion of the remainder was stocked with 

 onions and garlic. Nor is this altogether so extra- 

 ordinary a thing as it may, at first sight, appear. 

 For it is to be remembered that in the strictly 

 agricultural or rather, pastoral districts of the 

 principality (and in no other parts will the pecu- 

 liarity be observed), almost the entire food of 

 the people is a kind of vegetable broth, or rather 

 porridge, into which meat is rarely introduced ; 

 and that this cawl, as it is termed, has for its 

 principal ingredient a large quantity of chopped 

 leeks, so that a very full supply is necessary for 

 daily consumption throughout the year. And it 

 will be remembered, too, that in such localities it is 

 almost universally the custom, on account of the 

 extreme lowness of wages, for each labourer to have 

 the right of setting his row of potatoes in the field 

 of the farmer for whom he works, so that his little 

 garden is not occupied by the root which, elsewhere, 

 usually occupies the greater part of the cottage en- 

 closure, and it is therefore devoted to the plant next 

 in daily demand. I could refer to a case in which 

 a woman, newly removed from such a locality as 



