BOOK XXII. XXVIII. 56-xxix. 59 



XXVIII. We have also the lotometra," a plant 

 (lerived from the lotus. From its rotted seed, 

 Nvliich is Hke millet, are made by the shepherds in 

 l^gvpt loaves that they knead mostly with water or 

 milk. It is said that no bread is more healthful or 

 licrhter than this, so long as it is warm, but when 

 cold it becomes heavy and difficult of digestion. It 

 is an estabHshed f;ict that thosc who Hve on it are 

 never attacked by dysentery, tenesmus, or any other 

 disease of the bowels. Accordingly it is considered 

 to be one of the remedies for such aihTients. 



XXIX. I have spoken more than once ^ of the Heiimro 

 marvel of heliotropium, which turns round with the '"'""■ 

 sun even on a cloudy day, so great a love it has for 



that luminary. At night it closes its blue flower 

 as though it mourned.'' There are two varieties — 

 tricoccum and heHoscopium. The latter is the taller, 

 although neither is more than half a foot in height, 

 and sends out branches from a single '^ root. Its 

 seed, enclosed in a pod, is gathered at harvest time. 

 It grows nowhere but in a rich, well cultivated soil, 

 but tricoccum grows everywhere. I find it said 

 that, boiled, it is an agreeable sauce, that in milk it 

 is a gentle laxative, and that a draught of the decoc- 

 tion is a most drastic purge. The juice of the taller 

 plant is collected in summer at the sixth hour ; it is 

 mixed with wine, which makes it keep longer. 



accepted by Detlefsen and MayhofT, is doubtful, but a more 

 convincing correction of the impossible porri of the MSS. has 

 vet to be raade. 



" Seo II. § 109, XVIII. § 252. 



' Or, " vvere afflicted with longing." 



^ Or, with the reading ima, " from the bottom of the root." 

 Pliny seems to have gone wrong in several details, or to be 

 mixing up two plants. 



333 



