INDUSTRIAL AND ECONOMIC GRASSES. 61 



diameter. The parched traveller has only to cut one of 

 these stems below a knot, and he has a cup of water 

 at once. These reeds are used for thatching, and the 

 natives propel arrows from them instead of using bows. 

 Bamboo tissue makes good coarse paper in India. The 

 young shoots are good cooked as asparagus. 



The Arundo variegata, Royal Reed, or Canne Roy ale, 

 is much used for thatch ; the peasants make flutes and 

 fishing-lines of it, and use its root for medicine, accord- 

 ing to Duchesne. The same author states that a yellow 

 dye is drawn from the leaves and flowers of Arundo 

 Phragmites. 



The Elymus arenarms affords the nearest approach to 

 a corn crop attainable by the Icelanders, and this only 

 can be cultivated in very favourable localities. They 

 highly appreciate the seeds, call them Melur, and eat 

 them raw or made into cakes. Forbes, in his book on 

 Iceland, narrates that he found much of this grass spring- 

 ing from the white volcanic sand at the foot of Mount 

 Hekla, and was told that it had been planted there for 

 warmth and shelter. This grass, and Psamma arun- 

 dinacea, are very valuable on sandy shores, binding the 

 sand together, and thus forming a natural sea-wall ; in- 

 deed, so universally has their utility in this respect been 

 recognized, that they are protected by Act of Parlia- 

 ment. Sinclair thus speaks of them : — " So far back as 

 the reign of William the Third the important value of 

 the Elymus arenaria and the Arundo arenaria was so 

 well appreciated as to induce the Scottish Parliament of 

 that period to pass an Act for their preservation on the 

 seacoasts of Scotland. And these provisions were by 

 the British Parliament, in the reign of George the 

 Second, followed up by further enactments, extending 



