Phaselus 



Phaselus. 



' vilem . . . phaselum ' (Ge. i. 227). 



English editors of Virgil have gone much astray 

 on this plant, most of them identifying it with 

 the kidney bean or scarlet runner. Even if they 

 did not know that these plants are American, they 

 should have been warned by Virgil's advice to sow 

 the plant in November, for the kidney bean will bear 

 no touch of frost, and we do not sow it in the open 

 until May. Virgil's plant is Dolichus melanoph- 

 thalmus, an Asiatic, still common in Italian eating- 

 houses under the name of ' fagiolo dall' occhio,' the 

 eye bean. The ancients ate the whole pod as we do 

 French beans. Virgil's epithet is perhaps unduly 

 derogatory to a useful vegetable. 



The boat called ' phaselus ' is supposed to have 

 got its name from a resemblance to the fagiolo 

 dair occhio. 



Flower, summer. 



Italian name. See above. 



PiCEA. 



'nigranti picea ' {Ae. ix. 87). 

 'Naryciae . . . picis lucos' {Ge. ii. 438). 

 ' Idaeas . . . pices' (Ge. iii. 450). 



Although the identification of this tree has been 

 disputed, there are truths which seem to point to 

 a definite conclusion. It was the tree which pro- 

 duced the best pitch, and the best pitch came from 

 the mountains of the extreme south. The tree of 



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