Naturalisation in Extra-Tropical Countries. 541 



woody hardness and stiffer than those of any other palm [Drude]. 

 Germination of seeds easy [Lorentz and Hieronymus]. Another 

 species occurs in Southern Bolivia. 



Triticum junceum, Linn. (Agropyron junceum, Beauvois.) 



Europe and North-Africa. A rigid coast-grass, with pungent 

 leaves and extensively creeping roots, requiring sea-sand for its 

 permanent growth. One of the best grasses, to keep rolling sand- 

 ridges together, and particularly eligible, where cattle and other 

 domestic animals cannot readily be prevented from getting access. 



Triticum vulgare, Villars.* 



The Wheat. Indigenous to the Euphrates-regions, according to* 

 A. de Candolle. Traced back more than 5,000 years as an Egyptian 

 and Chinese culture-plant ; indeed the earliest lacustrine people in 

 Switzerland reared wheat in the stone-age [Heer]. Excellent wheat 

 was grown in Britain prior to the Christian era [Carruthers]. Among 

 the utilitarian plants of the world Wheat takes the very first position 

 through the widest area. In many intra-tropical countries, not too 

 wet, wheat and barley can be grown as winter-crop. At Irkutzk 

 some varieties of wheat ripen still during the short but warm summer, 

 though the soil three feet below the surface remains permanently 

 frozen [Dr. Z. Oppenheimer]. The hon. J. L. Dow introduced into 

 Australia a Mexican variety of Wheat, which matures six weeks 

 earlier than the ordinary sorts. In Japan some kind of wheat is of 

 extraordinary precocity [Lartigne], and it is greatly recommended 

 there as a forage-plant. The Punjab Wheat with a few other 

 varieties is usually rust-proof. The kinds of Rust-fungs, attacking 

 Wheat, are Puccinia graminis (Persoon), P. clandestina (Desmazieres) 

 or P. straminis (Fuckel) and P. coronata (Persoon). This is not the 

 place to enter into details about a plant universally known, unless 

 we may allude to the much overlooked fact, that a light beer can be 

 brewed from wheat. Cereal straw is now also already very exten- 

 sively used in the colony of Victoria as material for rough kinds of 

 paper. It may therefore suffice merely to mention, that three 

 primary varieties must be distinguished among the very numerous 

 sorts of cultivated wheat : 1 . Var. muticum (T. hybernum, L., the 

 Winter-Wheat or Unbearded Wheat j 2. Var. aristatum (T. aesti- 

 vum, L.), the Summer- Wheat or Bearded Wheat ; Var. aclhserens 

 (T. Spelta, L.), Wheat with fragile axis and adherent grain. 

 Metzger enumerates systematically as distinct kinds of cultivated 

 wheat : 



T. vulgare, Villars, which includes among other varieties the 

 ordinary Spring-Wheat, the Fox-wheat and the Kentish Wheat. 

 It comprises also the best Italian sorts for plaiting straw-bonnets 

 and straw-hats, for which only the upper part of the stem is 

 used, collected before the ripening of the grain, and bleached 

 through exposure to the sun while kept moistened. 



