No. 11- 1858-9.] SCRIPTURE BOTANY OF CEYLON. 337 



turban-like flowers, is indeed a most stately and striking ob- 

 ject. As this Lily is in flower at the season of the year when 

 the Sermon on the Mount is supposed to have been spoken, is 

 indigenous in the very locality, and is conspicuous, even in 

 the garden for its remarkable showy flowers, there can be 

 little doubt that it is the plant alluded to by our Saviour. 



Our magnificent, though common Qloriosa superba, and the 

 cultivated Tuberose, are members of the family, and will give 

 you no mean idea of the flower to which Solomon in all 

 his glory was compared. I have seen it once stated, that the 

 flower in question had some beautiful structure which bore 

 out the comparison ; but this is not necessary. 



Lentils, Beans, Barley, Wheat, Millet. 



" And Esau said to Jacob, Feed me, I pray the, with that 

 same red pottage, for I am faint. Then Jacob gave Esau 

 bread and pottage of lentils." (Gen. xxv. 30, 34.) 



The mess of pottage for which Esau sold his birthright, is 

 supposed to have been made from a small species of Pea, not 

 unlike the green gram of the bazaars, and called uhmdu 

 and gsSqiO, mune fa by the Sinhalese. The famous Re- 

 velenta Arabica is said to be the produce of lentils. 



" Barzillai the Gileadite of Rogelim brought beds, and 

 basons and earthen vessels and Wheat and Barley, and flour 

 and parched corn, and Beans and Lentils and parched pulse." 

 (2 Sam. xvii. 27, 28.) 



Beans of several kinds and varieties are amongst the most 

 common vegetables cultivated and sold in our Bazaars here. 

 It would rejoice the heart of a bean-curry-loving Sinhalese, 

 however, to see the fields of a different kind of Bean, as 

 cultivated in England. 



When surveying in the forests ol Sabaragamuwa, sixteen 

 years ago, my coolies and myself came upon some Sinhalese 

 who Jived under projecting stones, under one of which they 



