124 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



says it was cultivated in France in the time of Charlemagne 

 (800).* 



Bean. — Faba vulgaris, Mcench., natural order Leguminosce. 

 Tarieties of the Broad Bean have been found in the ruins of 

 Troy, and in the Swiss Lake dwellings of a prehistoric period. 

 Herodotus speaks of the Bean as never being cultivated in 

 Egypt, " and if it grows they do not eat it. The priests cannot 

 even endure the sight of it ; they imagine that this vegetable 

 is unclean." It was early known in Italy, as it was an ancient 

 Roman rite to put Beans in the sacrifices to the goddess Carna.t 

 Beans are mentioned with lentils in 2 Sam. xvii. 28, as being 

 brought to David. Faba vulgaris is believed to have been found 

 wild south of the Caspian Sea and in Algeria. M. de Candolle, 

 however, doubts the statement. 



Of leguminous plants " the honour," says Pliny,+ " must be 

 given to the Bean." In speaking of it as food, he says that it 

 was mixed with flour and made into bread. It was also used 

 for feeding cattle. Bean pottage occupied a place in religious 

 services. Pythagoras believed that the souls of the dead are 

 enclosed in the Bean, hence they were used in funeral banquets. 

 A remarkable statement of Pliny's is that "it fertilises the 

 ground in which it has been sown as well as any manure." We 

 now know the cause of this fact, that certain species of bacteria 

 invade the roots, giving rise to tubercles, and that by some 

 unknown method they can obtain nitrogen from the air. Con- 

 sequently leguminous crops, as a rule, do not require nitrogenous 

 manures, and the haulms of Peas and Beans should be always 

 chopped up and dug in the ground while still green if possible, 

 as the decay is more rapid then.§ 



Pea. — Pisum sativum, L., natural order Leguminoscz. This 

 plant is not known wild. Some botanist have thought it may 

 he a cultivated form of the Field Pea, P. arvense, L., wild in 

 Italy. It was cultivated in the time of Theophrastus, and it has 

 been found in the lake dwellings of Switzerland. It was not 

 Jmown in ancient Egypt nor in India, the so-called Mummy 



* Les Legumes et lea Fruits, p. 75. 



f De Candolle, Origin of Cult. Plants, p. 318. 



% Pliny, Nat. Hist, xviii. 30. 



§ The ancient Greeks and Romans also cultivated the Lupin (Lupinus 

 albus, L.) to bury it as a Pea manure (De Candolle, Or. of Cult. PL 

 p. 325). 



