340 PLANT-LORE OF SHAKESPEARE 
(5) To send measures of Wheat to Rome. 
Antony and Cleopatra , ii. 6, 36. 
(6) This is the foul fiend Flibbertigibbet. . . . He mildews the white 
Wheat, and hurts the poor creatures of earth.— King Lear, iii. 4, 120. 
(7) He that will have a cake out of the Wheat, must needs tarry the 
grinding.— Troilus and Cressida, i. 1, 15. 
(8) Davy. And again, sir, shall we sow the headland with Wheat? 
Shallow. With red Wheat, Davy.— 2 nd Henry IV, v. 1, 15. 
(9) Your Wheaten wreathe 
Was then nor threashed nor blasted. 
Two Noble Kinsmen , i. 1, 68. 
I might perhaps content myself with marking these passages 
only, and dismiss Shakespeare’s Wheat without further com¬ 
ment, for the Wheat of his day was identical with our own ; 
but there are a few points in connection with English Wheat 
which may be interesting. Wheat is not an English plant, nor 
is it a European plant; its original home is in Northern Asia, 
whence it has spread into all civilized countries. 1 For the 
cultivation of Wheat is one of the first signs of civilized life ; 
it marks the end of nomadic life, and implies more or less a 
settled habitation. When it reached England, and to what 
country we are indebted for it, we do not know; but we know 
that while we are indebted to the Romans for so many of our 
useful trees, and fruits, and vegetables, we are not indebted to 
them for the introduction of Wheat. This we might be almost 
sure of from the very name, which has no connection with the 
Latin names, triticum or frumentum , but is a pure old English 
word, signifying originally white , and so distinguishing it as 
the white grain in opposition to the darker grains of Oats and 
Rye. But besides the etymological evidence, we have good 
historical evidence that Caesar found Wheat growing in England 
when he first landed on the shores of Kent. He daily victualled 
1 Yet Homer considered it to be indigenous in Sicily—Odyss. ix. 
109 —and Cicero, perhaps on the authority of Homer, says the same: 
“Insula Cereris , . . ubi primum fruges inventae esse dicuntur.”— In 
Verrem , v. 38. 
