BOOK XII. XIV. 27 29 



infirmity, and inclement weather shrivels them up 

 and turns the seeds into barren husks, called bregma, 

 which is an Indian word meaning ' dead.' Of all 

 kinds of pepper this is the most pungent and the 

 lightest, and it is pale in colour. Black pepper is 

 more agreeable, but white pepper is of a milder 

 flavour than either the black or the ' long ' pepper. 



The root of the pepper-tree is not, as some people Ginger. 

 have thought, the same as the substance called 

 ginger, or by others zinpiberi, although it has a 

 similar flavour. Ginger is grown on farms in Arabia 

 and Cave-dwellers' Coimtry" ; it is a small plant with 

 a white root. The piant is hable to decay very 

 quickly, in spite of its extreme pungcncy. Its price 

 is six denarii a pound. It is easy to adulterate long 

 pepper with Alexandrian mustard. Long pepper is 

 sold at 15 denarii a pound, white pepper at 7. and 

 black at 4. It is remarkable that the use of pepper 

 has come so much into favour, as in the case of some 

 commodities their sweet taste has been an attraction, 

 and in others their appearance, but pepper has 

 nothing to recommend it in either fruit or berry. 

 To think that its only pleasing quahty is pungency 

 and that we go all the way to India to get this ! Who 

 was the first person who was wilHng to try it on his 

 viands, or in his greed for an appetite was not content 

 mercly to be hungry ? Both pepper and ginger grow 

 wild in their own countries, and nevertheless they 

 are bought by weight like gold or silver. Italy also 

 now possesses a pepper-tree that grows larger than a 

 myrtle, which it somewhat resembles. Its grains 

 have the same pungency as that beheved to belong 

 to myrtle-pepper, but when dried it lacks the ripeness 

 that the other has, and consequently has not the same 



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