: 
4 
; 
a 
4 
___ Penates, of the sites of the cities of Italy, etc. 
AMELLUS AS A SOURCE OF HONEY 135 
hyacinthus, Corycius item Siculusque bulbus croci deponitur, qui 
coloret odoretque mella”’; or in English: 
‘Moreover, a thousand seeds, either growing green in their 
native turf, or in the deep-tilled trench, bring into being flowers 
most friendly to the bees; as are, in their well-watered soil, the 
little bushes of aster, the stems of acanthus, the flower-shaft of 
asphodel, the little sword of narcissus. But in the prepared gar- 
den-beds shine white lilies, nor less than these, though more dim, 
the snowdrops, and then the ruddy roses, and the yellow and the 
purple violets; nor less dear to the celestial powers, the hya- 
cinth ; likewise the bulb of the Corycian and of the Sicilian crocus 
's set in the ground there, the crocus, that it may give color and 
may give odor to honey.”’ 
Columella, having thus mentioned Amellus at the head of his 
first list, the best wild sources of honey, proceeds with a second 
class of inferior sources, as follows : 
“ Now indeed there are produced of lesser note, innumerable 
herbs of both classes, in cultivated and in pastured lands, which 
make the wax of the honeycomb to abound ; as the common lap- 
sana,* and more valuable than that, the armoracia,+ and the 
greens of wild rape, the wild chicory, and the flowers of black: 
Poppy ; and then, the field parsnip, and, of the same name, that 
all-tamed parsnip which the Greeks call Svaphylinon. 
“In truth, above all those which I have mentioned, and those 
which I have omitted, in consequence of brevity of time—for be- 
yond computation is their number—it is thyme which gives to 
honey the most excellent flavor.” 
Columella makes mention of Amellus also when discussing the 
disease of bees which he terms profluvies alut, * caused ¢ he says by 
Ooverfeeding on “thymalus and udmus,” in the beginning of spring, 
and from which they die unless it is speedily checked. The trouble 
may be healed, he remarks, ‘by supplying them medicated food. 
Hyginus,§ following older authors, recommends keeping The RECS 
* Charlock, Harper's Dict. 
} Horse-radish is armoracia ; one MS. reads aremorana, 
¢Columella, bk. xiii, c. 13, section 8. 
4C. Julius Hyginus, from Spain, a friend of Ovid, and a freedman of Augustus, 
Who placed him in the Palatine Library; was author of many lost works, including the 
One on agriculture cited above, also ‘‘ Commentaries on Vergil,’’ accounts of the 
