230 



SCIEXCE-GOSSIP. 



such quantities that they form heaps a span high, 

 and one man can in a day collect four to six kilo- 

 grammes (about 12,000 to 20,000 pieces, varying in 

 size from a pea to a hazel-nut). This is especially 

 the case in the Steppes region and in the high Ismds 

 of South-West Asia, where the manna-lichen is used 



Fig. 2.— T.^w.JiR!x G.'iLLicA. — Shnib. 



as a substitute for corn in years of famine, being 

 ground in the same way, and baked into a species 

 of bread. . . • -^1 the great so-called rains of 

 manna, of which news has come from the East to 

 Europe, occurred at the beginning of the year, 

 between Januan.- and ZSIarch, i.i. at the time of 

 the hea\-iest rains." 



inches. Gobel analysed these, and believed them to 

 have been carried by electrical winds from distant 

 localities. He believed it to be Parmelia esculenta 

 (another synonym olLecanora £it'!(?c;!fa;, anativeof the 

 Steppes and the districts betv.een the Caspian and 

 Aral Seas. In 1829, during the war between Persia 

 and Russia, there was a great famine in Orumiah, 

 south-west of the Caspian. One day, during a 

 \-iolent wind, the surface of the country was covered 

 with a lichen which " fell down from heaven." 

 The sheep immediateh- attacked and eagerly 

 devoured it, which suggested to the inhabitants 

 the idea of reducing it to flour and making bread 

 of it, which was found to be good and nourishing. 



In the spring of 1841 there v.as an astonishing 

 fall of the same substance near Lake Van, in the 

 east of Asia Minor. It covered the ground three 

 or four inches in depth. The pieces were of the 

 size of hailstones, grey in colour and pleasant to 

 the taste. A white meal was prepared from them 

 which provided a rather tasteless bread. 



In Januarj', 1846, at Jenischehir, in the west of 

 Asia ]\Iinor, and the surrounding districts, during 

 a time of famine, a similar fall took place. It 

 lasted some daj-s, and the pieces of lichen were of 



Fig. 5.— Ta:.:.= 



cALLiCA. — Tree. 



In an article in the " Gardeners' Chronicle"' for 

 September, 1849, it is stated that this lichen springs 

 up '.\ith great rapidity after rain on the Khirgiz 

 Steppes and in Central Asia, and it is mentioned 

 that accounts had then recently been received of 

 the fall — as it were from the skies — of prodigious 

 quantities in one night in the neighbourhood of 

 Erzerum, in Armenia. It is added that Parrot 

 brought specimens collected in the beginning of 

 1S28 which v.ere said to have descended from the 

 skies in some districts of Persia, and to have 

 covered the ground to the depth of five or six 



the size of hazel-nuts. They were ground into 

 flour, the bread from which was pronounced little 

 inferior to wheat bread. Another account says 

 that the manna was of a greyish-white colour, 

 rather hard and irregular in form, inodorous and 

 insipid. 



In the year 1847 a report v.-as made by General 

 Jussuf, the Commander of the French troops, to the 

 Governor of Algiers, on the subject of an edible 

 lichen spread over a large portion of the Sahara 

 and the Algerian plateaux, which he said had 

 been a sustenance to the troops during the 



