414 ON THE MILLETS AND OTHER SMALL-GRAINED GRASSES. 



list of grain plants, as far as nutritive power is concerned, and hence 

 the necessity also for adding pulse, &c, in order to bring its important 

 ingredients into due proportion. This grain in some districts is looked 

 upon entirely as a famine food, and only had recourse to in seasons of 

 drought, when other crops are very defective. In some places during 

 ordinary seasons as much as from 130 to 140 lbs. are procurable for a 

 couple of shillings. A third part of the inhabitants of the globe feed 

 upon the various millets, especially those of Africa, the greater part of 

 Turkey, Persia, and India. Millet forms the principal sustenance of the 

 people of Bokhara. The grain there yields so abundant a harvest that 

 there is a large quantity for export. The seeds of millet are excellent 

 for food both to domestic animals and man. The grain mixed with 

 that of wheat gives an excellent bread, though a little heavy ; but gene- 

 rally it is boiled with milk, like maize flour ; it swells considerably in 

 water. Millet fattens poultry in a very short time. The stalks serve 

 for heating ovens or for cooking food in countries where fuel is scarce* 

 The panicles, after the separation of the grain, form excellent brooms. 

 The sale of these brooms in Italy, in Spain, France, and North America, 

 is so remunerative that they enter largely into the value of the profits 

 of culture. An article on the growth of millet for the manufacture of 

 brooms in the United States will be found at Vol. i., Technologist, 

 page 239. 



The seed is kept like wheat in granaries or sacks, but it loses its 

 flavour with age, and with humidity gets mouldy, and is much subject 

 to the attacks of weevil. 



Sorghums. 



In Paxton's ' Botanical Dictionary,' eleven species of Sorghum are 

 enumerated — namely, S. avenaceum (Holcus avenaceus, Linn.), bicolor, 

 Caffrorum, or arduini, cernuum, elongatum, halepense, nigrum, rubens, 

 saccharatum, and vulgare. 



The two genera Andropogon and Sorghum are closely allied. Some of 

 the best authorities consider the difference so slight as to warrant their 

 union into one. Steudel arranges Andropogon, Sorghum, and Trachy- 

 pogon all under one head — Andropogon. Lindley italicises Sorghum in 

 the last edition of his "Vegetable Kingdom," and places it beneath 

 Trachypogon, evidently considering them equivalent. The differences 

 between them are these : — 



Andropogon. Sorghum. 



Inflorescence spicate. Inflorescence paniculate. 



Spikelets in pairs, only one being Spikelets in twos or threes, cen- 



fertile. tral one only being fertile. 



Glumes herbaceous or mem- Glumes hard, coriaceous or in- 



branaceous. durated. 



Rachis hairy. Rachis smooth. 



Sugar Millet. — Sorghum saccharatus, Willd. ; Andropogon saccha- 

 ratus, Kuuth and Roxb. ; BTolcus saccharatus, Linn. — Deodhan, Hind ; 



