chap, xxvi jl 



CONCLUDING REMARKS. 



429 



scribed by Columella, and certainly with the nectarine. The doo-s 

 represented on the Egyptian monuments, about 2000 B.C., show 

 us that some of the chief breeds then existed, but it is extremely 

 doubtful whether any are identically the same with our present 

 breeds. A great mastiff sculptured on an Assyrian tomb, 640 B.C., 

 is said to be the same with the clog still imported into the same 

 region from Thibet. The true greyhound existed during the 

 Roman classical period. Coining down to a later period, we 

 have seen that, though most of the chief breeds of the pigeon 

 existed between two and three centuries ago, they have not 

 all retainecj to the present day exactly the same character ; but 

 this has occurred in certain cases in which improvement was 

 not desired, for instance in the case of the Spot or the Indian 

 ground-tumbler. 



De Candolle 12 has fully discussed the antiquity of various 

 races of plants; he states that the black-seeded poppy was 

 known in the time of Homer, the white-seeded sesamum by the 

 ancient Egyptians, and almonds with sweet and bitter kernels 

 by the Hebrews ; but it does not seem improbable that some of 

 these varieties may have been lost and reappeared. One variety 

 of barley and apparently one of wheat, both of which were cul- 

 tivated at an immensely remote period by the Lake-inhabitants 

 of Switzerland, still exist. It is said 13 that " specimens of a 

 " small variety of gourd which is still common in the market 

 " of Lima were exhumed from an ancient cemetery in Peru," De 

 Candolle remarks that, in the books and drawings of the sixteenth 

 century, the principal races of the cabbage, turnip, and gourd 

 can be recognised ; this might have been expected at so late a 

 period, but whether any of these plants are absolutely identical 

 with our present sub-varieties is not certain. It is, however, 

 said that the Brussels sprout, a variety which in some places 

 is liable to degeneration, has remained genuine for more than 

 four centuries in the district where it is believed to have 

 originated. 14 



In accordance with the views maintained by me in this work 

 and elsewhere, not only the various domestic races, but the 



12 ' Geograplaie Botan.,' 1855, p. 989. 14 ' Journal of a Horticultural Tour,' 



13 Pickering, ' Races of Man,' 1850, by a Deputation of the Caledonian Hist. 

 p - 318 - Soc, 1823, p. 293. 



