CHAP. 44. (17.)—THE DISEASES OF GRAIN: THE OAT.
The foremost feature of disease in wheat is the oat.[308] Barley, too, will degenerate into the oat; so much so, in fact, that the oat has become an equivalent for corn; for the people of Germany are in the habit of sowing it, and make their porridge of nothing else. This degeneracy is owing more particularly to humidity of soil and climate; and a second cause is a weakness in the seed, the result of its being retained too long in the ground before it makes its appearance above it. The same, too, will be the consequence, if the seed is decayed when put in the ground. This may be known, however, the moment it makes its appearance, from which it is quite evident that the defect lies in the root. There is another form of disease, too, which closely resembles the oat, and which supervenes when the grain, already developed to its full size, but not ripe, is struck by a noxious blast, before it has acquired its proper body and strength; in this case, the seed pines away in the ear, by a kind of abortion, as it were, and totally disappears.
The wind is injurious to wheat and barley, at three[309] periods of the year in particular: when they are in blossom, directly the blossom has passed off, and just as the seed is beginning to ripen. In this last case, the grain wastes away, while in the two former ones it is prevented from being developed. Gleams of sunshine, every now and then, from the midst of clouds, are injurious to corn. Maggots, too, breed[310] in the roots, when the rains that follow the seed-time are succeeded by a sudden heat, which encloses the humidity in the ground. Maggots make their appearance,[311] also, in the grain, when the ear ferments through heat succeeding a fall of rain. There is a small beetle, too, known by the name of “cantharis,”[312] which eats away the blade. All these insects die, however, as soon as their nutriment fails them. Oil,[313] pitch, and grease are prejudicial to grain, and care should be taken not to let them come in contact with the seed that is sown. Rain is only beneficial to grain while in the blade; it is injurious to wheat and barley while they are in blossom, but is not detrimental to the leguminous plants, with the exception of the chick-pea. When grain is beginning to ripen, rain is injurious, and to barley in particular. There is a white grass[314] that grows in the fields, very similar to panic in appearance, but fatal to cattle. As to darnel,[315] the tribulus,[316] the thistle,[317] and the burdock,[318] I can consider them, no more than the bramble, among the maladies that attack the cereals, but rather as so many pests inflicted on the earth. Mildew,[319] a malady resulting from the inclemency of the weather, and equally attacking the vine[320] and corn, is in no degree less injurious. It attacks corn most frequently in localities which are exposed to dews, and in vallies which have not a thorough draught for the wind; windy and elevated spots, on the other hand, are totally exempt from it. Another evil, again, in corn, is over-luxuriance, when it falls to the ground beneath the weight[321] of the grain. One evil, however, to which all crops in common, the chick-pea even, are exposed, is the attacks of the caterpillar, when the rain, by washing away the natural saltness of the vegetation, makes it[322] all the more tempting for its sweetness.
There is a certain plant,[323] too, which kills the chick-pea and the fitch, by twining around them; the name of it is “orobanche.” In a similar manner, also, wheat is attacked by darnel,[324] barley by a long-stalked plant, called “ægilops,”[325] and the lentil by an axe-leafed grass, to which, from the resemblance[326] of the leaf, the Greeks have given the name of “pelecinon.” All these plants, too, kill the others by entwining around them. In the neighbourhood of Philippi, there is a plant known as ateramon,[327] which grows in a rich soil, and kills the bean, after it has been exposed, while wet, to the blasts of a certain wind: when it grows in a thin, light soil, this plant is called “teramon.” The seed of darnel is extremely minute, and is enclosed in a prickly husk. If introduced into bread, it will speedily produce vertigo; and it is said that in Asia and Greece, the bath-keepers, when they want to disperse a crowd of people, throw this seed upon burning coals. The phalangium, a diminutive insect of the spider genus,[328] breeds in the fitch, if the winter happens to be wet. Slugs, too, breed in the vetch, and sometimes a tiny snail makes its way out of the ground, and eats it away in a most singular manner.
These are pretty nearly all the maladies to which grain is subject.
CHAP. 45.—THE BEST REMEDIES FOR THE DISEASES OF GRAIN.
The best remedy for these maladies, so long as grain is in the blade, is the weeding-hook, and, at the moment of sowing, ashes.[329] As to those diseases which develope themselves in the seed and about the root, with due care precautions may be effectually employed against them. It is generally supposed that if seed has been first steeped in wine,[330] it will be less exposed to disease. Virgil[331] recommends that beans should be drenched with nitre and amurca of olives; and he says that if this is done, they will be all the larger. Some persons, again, are of opinion, that they will grow of increased size, if the seed is steeped for three days before it is sown in a solution of urine and water. If the ground, too, is hoed three times, a modius of beans in the pod, they say, will yield not less than a modius of shelled[332] beans. Other seeds, again, it is said, will be exempt from the attacks of maggots, if bruised cypress[333] leaves are mixed with them, or if they are sown just at the moon’s conjunction. Many persons, for the more effectual protection of millet, recommend that a bramble-frog should be carried at night round the field before the hoeing is done, and then buried in an earthen vessel in the middle of it. If this is done, they say, neither sparrows nor worms will attack the crop. The frog, however, must be disinterred before the millet is cut; for if this is neglected, the produce will be bitter. It is pretended, too, that all seeds which have been touched by the shoulders of a mole are remarkably productive.
Democritus recommends that all seeds before they are sown should be steeped in the juice of the herb known as “aizoüm,”[334] which grows on tiles or shingles, and is known to us by the Latin name of “sedum” or “digitellum.”[335] If blight prevails, or if worms are found adhering to the roots, it is a very common remedy to sprinkle the plants with pure amurca of olives without salt, and then to hoe the ground. If, however, the crop should be beginning to joint, it should be stubbed at once, for fear lest the weeds should gain the upper hand. I know for certain[336] that flights of starlings and sparrows, those pests to millet and panic, are effectually driven away by means of a certain herb, the name of which is unknown to me, being buried at the four corners of the field: it is a wonderful thing to relate, but in such case not a single bird will enter it. Mice are kept away by the ashes of a weasel or a cat being steeped in water and then thrown upon the seed, or else by using the water in which the body of a weasel or a cat has been boiled. The odour, however, of these animals makes itself perceived in the bread even; for which reason it is generally thought a better plan to steep the seed in ox-gall.[337] As for mildew, that greatest curse of all to corn, if branches of laurel are fixed in the ground, it will pass away from the field into the leaves of the laurel. Over-luxuriance in corn is repressed by the teeth of cattle,[338] but only while it is in the blade; in which case, if depastured upon ever so often, no injury to it when in the ear will be the result. If the ear, too, is once cut off, the grain, it is well known, will assume a larger[339] form, but will be hollow within and worthless, and if sown, will come to nothing.
At Babylon, however, they cut the blade twice, and then let the cattle pasture on it a third time, for otherwise it would run to nothing but leaf. Even then, however, so fertile is the soil, that it yields fifty, and, indeed, with care, as much as a hundred, fold. Nor is the cultivation of it attended with any difficulty, the only object being to let the ground be under water as long as possible, in order that the extreme richness and exuberance of the soil may be modified. The Euphrates, however, and the Tigris do not deposit a slime, in the same way that the Nilus does in Egypt, nor does the soil produce vegetation spontaneously; but still, so great is the fertility, that, although the seed is only trodden in with the foot, a crop springs up spontaneously the following year. So great a difference in soils as this, reminds me that I ought to take this opportunity of specifying those which are the best adapted for the various kinds of grain.