Vegetable substances used for the food of man / [Edwin Lankester].

  • Lankester, Edwin, 1814-1874.
Date:
1832
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Vegetable substances used for the food of man / [Edwin Lankester]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    28/418 (page 12)
    unwholesome in their natural state, with the single exception of Lolium temulentum (darnel), a common weed in many parts of England, the effects of which are undoubtedly deleterious, although perhaps much exaggerated. In this respect an approach seems to ~ -be naturally made to the properties of half-putrid wheat, which are known to be dangerous.’ * The presence of the corn-plants in any region of the earth attests that man is there, in an advanced stage of civilization. In the sepulchres of the Egyp- tian kings, which were opened by the naturalists and other scientific persons Who accompanied the French army to Egypt, was found the common wheat, in vessels: which were so perfectly closed, that the grains retained both their form and .their colour.T The wheat, buried there for several thousand years, “was a proof of the ancient civilization of Egypt, as convincing as the ruins of temples and the inscrip- tions of obelisks. ‘The corn-plants, such as they are found under cultivation, do not grow wild in any part- of the earth: Wheat has been traced, indeed, in Persia, springing up in spots very remote from human habitation, and out of the line of the traffic of the natives ; but-this circumstance is far from proving that it is a production natural-and indige- nous to Persia. In Sicily there is a wild grass called (Egilops ovata, which is found in particular districts. It has been held that the seeds of this plant may be changed into corn by cultivation ; and that the an- cient worship of Ceres, which considered the. fields of Enna and of Trinacria as the cradles of agricul- ture, had its origin in this transformation of the na- tive grass. Professor Latapie, of Bourdeaux, affirms, * Lindley’s < Introduction to the Natural System of Bota- ny,’ p. 302. + See Lyell’s Geology, vol. ii, p. 81.