THE BARLEY CROP. 95 



vation would then have displaced the spontaneous denizens 

 of the soil, to an extent which would render it impossible 

 to distinguish, on the same spot, the successors of those 

 plants which originally were indigenous to the soil, from 

 cultivated plants of the same species. The native country 

 of our principal cereals is therefore unknown, and probably 

 will ever remain so. 



In Roman agriculture barley was largely cultivated, and 

 frequent mention is made of it by nearly all the authors 

 whose works have been transmitted to us. Full direc- 

 tions are given as to the time of sowing, the descriptions 

 of soil best suited for it, and the mode of treating the soil ; 

 all of which show the great attention they paid to those 

 points of farm management, which too many of us of the 

 present day leave entirely disregarded, to take their chance. 

 Not only was barley cultivated and used by the ancients 

 as a bread-corn, and as food for their animals, but it would 

 appear they were also accustomed to steep it, and thus 

 prepare an intoxicating drink by which the inhabitants 

 of the western nations, Spain and Gaul countries at 

 that period less civilized than Italy were accustomed to 

 transgress the rules of sobriety. By this method of treat- 

 ing it they obtained a " scum," which not only was very 

 valuable to them in the preparation of their bread, 1 but 

 the ladies also esteemed it highly as a cosmetic, and used 

 it in a diluted form as a wash for their faces. 2 Thus we 

 see that the fermentation of barley, and the conversion of 

 its farinaceous constituents into alcohol malting and 

 brewing was known at a very early period, and that the 

 scum arising from it our "yeast" was applied by the 

 Romans to the same useful purposes in bread-making as 

 we apply it now; while at the same time we are willing 



1 " Spuma ita concreta pro fermento utuntur. Qu& de causa levior illis 

 quain cseteris, panis est." 



2 "Quorum omnium spuma cutem foeminarum in facie nutrit." Pliny 

 Nat. Hist., lib, xviii. cap. vii. 



