OF ACCOMPANYING ANIMALS AND PLANTS. 1 65 



1095 B. C. (= 1071 -(- "25th year" of Euseb., see also Ctesias in Diodor. ii. 21), accession 

 of Teutamos as Assyrian emperor. 



The same year(= 1091 -f- "4 years " of Apollod. ii. 8. 2, see also Horn. it. xix. 123, Thucyd. i. 9, 

 Euseb. ii. p. 288, and Clint, i. p. 106, Castor's numbers corresponding very closely 991 -|- '• 105 years 

 of the Pelopidas " = 1096), the Argive king Eurystheus son of Sthenelas II., slain in battle; suc- 

 ceeded by two sons of Pelops, Thyestes at Mycenae, and Atreus at Argos. 



As early possibly as this date, Jewish colonists settling at the Southern extreme of Arabia. — - 

 An offshoot of these colonists is perhaps found in the Zaffe-Hibrahim inhabiting the island of Nossi 

 Hibrahim and neighbouring portion of Madagascar : who brought with them Geomancy or foretelling 

 by fingers, practise circumcision, will not intermarry with strangers, observe Saturday, claim descent 

 from Abraham, and have retained the names of Noah, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, and Moses ; but know 

 nothing of later prophets, nor of the author of Christianity, nor of Mohammed, whose followers they 

 regard as " Caffres " or destitute of laws (Flacourt praf.). 



Theseus on his expedition against the Marathonian bull hospitably entertained by a poor old 

 woman named Hecale, — in whose honour he subsquently ordained in Attica a sacrifice, to her and 

 Zeus Hecalus (Callim., Ov. rem. am. 747, and Plut. thes.). 



Sonchus oleraceus of Europe and Northern Asia. Called in Old German " du-tistel," in Anglo- 

 Saxon " thuthistel " or " thufethistel " all meaning sprout thistle, in Ortus Sanitatis 148 " suwe-distel " 

 or " saw-distel," in current English, sow thistle (Prior), in current German "gansedistel " (Grieb), in 

 France "laiteron" (Nugent), in Italy " cicerbita " or " sonco " (Lenz), in Greece "sohos" (Sibth.), 

 in Egypt " galayl " or "libbeyn" (Del.) ; in which we recognize the "sonchos" placed by Hecale 

 before Theseus — (Callim., and Plin.), mentioned as esculent by Dioscorides, and the " albus " kind 

 by Cleemporus (Plin. xxii. 44) : the " soghos " is also mentioned by Matron, Antiphanes, Hegesander, 

 Theophrastus, Erasistratus, Nicander, as medicinal by Agathocles, and Zenon, and was known to 

 Athenaeus in Egypt : S. oleraceus was observed by Sibthorp frequent in waste and cultivated ground 

 throughout Greece and the Greek islands ; by Forskal, and Delile, around Cairo in Egypt. West- 

 ward, is described by Tournefort inst. 474; was observed by Forskal on Malta as well as near Mar- 

 seilles ; and is known to grow throughout middle and Northern Europe as far as Lapland (fl. Dan. 

 pi. 682, Fries, and Wats.). Southward from Egypt, was observed by Forskal among the mountains 

 of Yemen and called " myrrejr," and was received from Abyssinia by Richard. Eastward, is known 

 to grow throughout Siberia and in Nepal (Ledeb., and Wats.); was observed by Nimmo "at Surat," 

 and by Lush " in Deccan gardens " (Graham) ; by Roxburgh, and Wight, in other parts of Hindustan ; 

 by Blume, on Java ; by Thunberg, in Japan, frequent and called " fsitsikusa ; " and probably by Poly- 

 nesian navigators was carried throughout the islands of the Pacific to New Zealand (where it was 

 found by Cook and Forster) and Southeast Australia (where it was found by R. Brown). Clearly by 

 European colonists, was carried prior to 1669 (Jossel.) to Northeast America, where it has extended 

 itself from Newfoundland to our Southern States (Chapm.) and throughout Canada to the Saskatch- 

 awan and mouth of the Columbia (Hook.), following the fur traders as verified by myself at Fort 

 Nisqually on Puget Sound ; to the West Indies (Swartz, and Wydl), Rio Janeiro and Buenos Ayres 

 (herb. Dec), Patagonia and Peru (observed by myself), Chili, the Chonos archipelago, Falkland 

 Islands, and Tristan d'Acunha (Hook., and A. Dec.) ; to the Mauritius Islands (Bojer) ; to South- 

 west Australia, where it was unknown before English settlement (J. Drummond in Hook, journ. 

 1840) ; to the remote Aukland Islands, the only evidence of prior visits of mariners obtained by Dr. 

 Silas Holmes on our Expedition ; seems in fact the pioneer of plants accompanying man, the first to 

 acquire foothold even within the Tropics. 



Asparagus acutifolius of the Mediterranean countries. A kind of wild asparagus called in Italy 

 " sparaghella " or " asparago selvatico " (Lenz), in Greece " sparaggi " or " spharaggia " (Sibth.) or 

 " asparaggia " (Fraas) ; in which we recognize the " aspharagos " thickets that concealed Perigyne 

 beloved of Theseus, — the plant in consequence protected by law among the Ionians inhabiting Caria 

 (Plut. thes. viii) : the " aspharagon " is mentioned also by Cratinus, Pherecrates, Phrynichus, Ameip- 

 sias, Antiphanes, Theopompus, Athenaeus ii. p. 240 ; and the " asparagos pgtraios " of Dioscorides 

 is identified in the added Synonyms with the " muon " or " muakanthan : " A. acutifolius was observed 

 by Forskal, Sibthorp, and Fraas, from the Peloponnesus to Constantinople ; by Chaubard, abound- 

 ing in the Peloponnesus. Westward, the " myacanthon " or " hormenum " or " libycum " or " silves- 

 trem asparagum" is identified by Pliny xvi 67 and xx. 43 with the " corruda " of Cato and others ; 

 A. acutifolius is termed " a. foliis acutis " by Tournefort inst. 300 ; was observed by Forskal near 

 Marseilles ; is known to grow also in Italy, Spain, and Portugal, its young sprouts eaten (Pers.). 



Asparagus aphyllus of the Mediterranean countries. Called in Greece by the same names as 

 the preceding (Sibth.), in Egypt "a'aqoul" or "shouk" (Del ) ; and probably included with the pre- 

 ceding species: — the "aspharagos " is enumerated by Theophrastus vi. 4- 1 as one of the two leaf- 

 less ptants known to him : A. aphyllus is termed " a. creticus fruticosus crassioribus et brevioribus 



