easy and abundant multiplicability, becomes the primal treasure of human economy.
3. It has been the practice of botanists of all nations to consider the seeds of the grasses together with those of roses and pease, as if all could be described on the same principles, and with the same nomenclature of parts. But the grain of corn is a quite distinct thing from the seed of pease. In it, the husk and the seed envelope have become inextricably one. All the exocarps, endocarps, epicarps, mesocarps, shells, husks, sacks, and skins, are woven at once together into the brown bran; and inside of that, a new substance is collected for us, which is not what we boil in pease, or poach in eggs, or munch in nuts, or grind in coffee;—but a thing which, mixed with water and then baked, has given to all the nations of the world their prime word for food, in thought and prayer,—Bread; their prime conception of the man's and woman's labor in preparing it—("whoso putteth hand to the plough"—two women shall be grinding at the mill)—their prime notion of the means of cooking by fire—("which to-day is, and to-morrow is cast into the oven"), and their prime notion of culinary office—the "chief baker," cook, or pastrycook,—(compare Bedreddin Hassan in the Arabian Nights): and, finally, to modern civilization, the Saxon word 'lady,' with whatever it imports.
4. It has also been the practice of botanists to confuse all the ripened products of plants under the general term
'fruit.' But the essential and separate fruit-gift is of two substances, quite distinct from flour, namely, oil and wine, under the last term including for the moment all kinds of juice which will produce alcohol by fermentation. Of these, oil may be produced either in the kernels of nuts, as in almonds, or in the substance of berries, as in the olive, date, and coffee-berry. But the sweet juice which will become medicinal in wine, can only be developed in the husk, or in the receptacle.
5. The office of the Chief Butler, as opposed to that of the Chief Baker, and the office of the Good Samaritan, pouring in oil and wine, refer both to the total fruit-gift in both kinds: but in the study of plants, we must primarily separate our notion of their gifts to men into the three elements, flour, oil, and wine; and have instantly and always intelligible names for them in Latin, French, and English.
And I think it best not to confuse our ideas of pure vegetable substance with the possible process of fermentation:—so that rather than 'wine,' for a constant specific term, I will take 'Nectar,'—this term more rightly including the juices of the peach, nectarine, and plum, as well as those of the grape, currant, and apple.
Our three separate substances will then be easily named in all three languages:
| Farina. | Oleum. | Nectar. |
| Farine. | Huile. | Nectare. |
| Flour. | Oil. | Nectar. |
There is this farther advantage in keeping the third common term, that it leaves us the words Succus, Jus, Juice, for other liquid products of plants, watery, milky, sugary, or resinous,—often indeed important to man, but often also without either agreeable flavor or nutritious power; and it is therefore to be observed with care that we may use the word 'juice,' of a liquid produced by any part of a plant, but 'nectar,' only of the juices produced in its fruit.