HISTORY. 49 



newed, filled with health and vigor, when his reason 

 returned and of course he did what any healthy man 

 will do daily, blessed the Most High and praised 

 Him and was humbled and glad once more. 



It is related that in the old kingdom of Babylonia 

 wheat would yield 200 fold and sometimes 300 fold, 

 which plainly indicates that it must have been sown 

 thinly in drills upon alfalfa sod, irrigated from the 

 canals with which that country abounded, and prob- 

 ably weeded and cultivated by slave labor. 



About 500 years before Christ the Persians invad- 

 ed Greece. Now, Greeks are stubborn folks, or were 

 in those days, and many were the battles before the 

 Greeks were even in part conquered. The Persians, 

 aided by Greek factions and tribes, doggedly toiled 

 steadily onward, taking city after city. Wherever 

 they went they had chariot horses to feed and cattle 

 bulls, so legend says for fighting, and cows no 

 doubt for helping feed the army. With curious mix- 

 ture of martial and agricultural zeal they brought 

 with them alfalfa seed and wherever they conquered 

 foothold they sowed alfalfa. An army travels, and 

 fights, on its belly, so it was a mighty help to the 

 Greeks to have the aid of the alfalfa. And without 

 doubt it was eaten by the soldiers as well, since green 

 succulent alfalfa has always been boiled and eaten 

 as greens or pottage. Unhappily the Persians 

 sent away hosts of the Greek subjects as slaves to 

 Asia, else when they had gone on the people might 

 have been almost benefited by the war, since alfalfa 

 fields were left in the wake of the army. It must be 



