VITALITY OF SEEDS. 19 



of wheat and other seeds taken from the wrappings 

 of Egyptian mummies, or from the tombs in which 

 mummies were found. 



In a recent number of the Christian Union I 

 find this statement bj' Canon Wilberforce, the great 

 English preacher: " I have seen beneath the micro- 

 scope a seed 3,000 years old start into instant 

 germination "when touched with a drop of warm 

 water; so a human soul, long apparently lifeless, 

 begins _to grow when touched with the water of 

 life." In the New York Voice, for March 27, 1890, 

 is the following, entitled " Seed Corn 4,000 years 

 Old." "During the season of 1889 a most remark- 

 able crop of corn was raised by David Drew, at 

 Plymouth, New Hampshire. In 1888, Mr. Drew 

 came into possession of some corn grains found 

 wrapped with a mummy in Egypt, supposed to be 

 4,000 years old. These were planted and grew. It 

 had many of the characteristics of real corn; the 

 leaves were alternate; it grew to be over six feet 

 high; the midribs were white; but the product of 

 the stock — there is where the curious part came in. 

 Instead of growing in an ear like modern maize, it 

 hung in heavy clusters at the top, on spikelets; 

 there was no tassel, no silk, each sprig was thickly 

 studded with grain, each provided with a separate 

 husk, like wheat grains." [Evidently sorghum.] 



In the London Times for September, 1840, Mar- 



