Next in affinity to these plants are the bulbs,[1020] which Cato, speaking in high terms of those of Megara,[1021] recommends most particularly for cultivation. Among these bulbs, the squill,[1022] we find, occupies the very highest rank, although by nature it is medicinal, and is employed for imparting an additional sharpness to vinegar:[1023] indeed, there is no bulb known that grows to a larger size than this, or is possessed of a greater degree of pungency. There are two varieties of it employed in medicine, the male squill, which has white leaves, and the female squill, with black[1024] ones. There is a third kind also, which is good to eat, and is known as the Epimenidian[1025] squill; the leaf is narrower than in the other kinds, and not so rough. All the squills have numerous seeds, but they come up much more quickly if propagated from the offsets that grow on the sides. To make them attain a still greater size, the large leaves that grow around them are turned down and covered over with earth; by which method all the juices are carried to the heads. Squills grow spontaneously and in vast numbers in the Baleares and the island of Ebusus, and in the Spanish provinces.[1026] The philosopher Pythagoras has written a whole volume on the merits of this plant, setting forth its various medicinal properties; of which we shall have occasion to speak more at length in the succeeding Book.[1027]
The other species of bulbs are distinguished by their colour, size, and sweetness; indeed, there are some that are eaten raw even—those found in the Tauric Chersonesus, for instance. Next to these, the bulbs of Africa are held in the highest esteem, and after them those of Apulia. The Greeks have distinguished the following varieties: the bulbine,[1028] the setanion,[1029] the opition,[1030] the cyix,[1031] the leucoion,[1032] the ægilips,[1033] and the sisyrinchion[1034]—in the last there is this remarkable feature, that the extremities of the roots increase in winter, but during the spring, when the violet appears, they diminish in size and gradually contract, and then it is that the bulb begins to increase in magnitude.
Among the varieties of the bulb, too, there is the plant known in Egypt by the name of “aron.”[1035] In size it is very nearly as large as the squill, with a leaf like that of lapathum, and a straight stalk a couple of cubits in length, and the thickness of a walking-stick: the root of it is of a milder nature, so much so, indeed, as to admit of being eaten raw.
Bulbs are taken up before the spring, for if not, they are apt to spoil very quickly. It is a sign that they are ripe when the leaves become dry at the lower extremities. When too old they are held in disesteem; the same, too, with the long and the smaller ones; those, on the other hand, which are red and round are greatly preferred, as also those of the largest size. In most of them there is a certain degree of pungency in the upper part, but the middle is sweet. The ancients have stated that bulbs are reproduced from seed only, but in the champaign country of Præneste they grow spontaneously, and they grow to an unlimited extent in the territory of the Remi.[1036]
CHAP. 31. (6.)—THE ROOTS, FLOWERS, AND LEAVES OF ALL THESE PLANTS. GARDEN PLANTS WHICH LOSE THEIR LEAVES.
Nearly all[1037] the garden plants have a single[1038] root only, radishes, beet, parsley, and mallows, for example; it is lapathum, however, that has the longest root of them all, it attaining the length of three cubits even. The root of the wild kind is smaller and of a humid nature, and when up it will keep alive for a considerable period. In some of these plants, however, the roots are fibrous, as we find the case in parsley and mallows, for instance; in others, again, they are of a ligneous nature, as in ocimum, for example; and in others they are fleshy, as in beet, and in saffron even more so. In some, again, the root is composed of rind and flesh, as in the radish and the rape; while in others it is jointed, as in hay grass.[1039] Those plants which have not a straight root throw out immediately a great number of hairy fibres, orage[1040] and blite,[1041] for instance: squills again, bulbs, onions, and garlic never have any but a vertical root. Among the plants that grow spontaneously, there are some which have more numerous roots than leaves, spalax,[1042] for example, pellitory,[1043] and saffron.[1044]
Wild thyme, southernwood, turnips, radishes, mint, and rue blossom all[1045] at once; while others, again, shed their blossom directly they have begun to flower. Ocimum[1046] blossoms gradually, beginning at the lower parts, and hence it is that it is so very long in blossom: the same is the case, too, with the plant known as heliotropium.[1047] In some plants the flower is white, in others yellow, and in others purple. The leaves fall first[1048] from the upper part in wild-marjoram and elecampane, and in rue[1049] sometimes, when it has been injured accidentally. In some plants the leaves are hollow, the onion and the scallion,[1050] more particularly.
CHAP. 32.—VARIETIES OF THE ONION.
Garlic and onions[1051] are invoked by the Egyptians,[1052] when taking an oath, in the number of their deities. The Greeks have many varieties[1053] of the onion, the Sardian onion, the Samothracian, the Alsidenian, the setanian, the schistan, and the Ascalonian,[1054] so called from Ascalon,[1055] a city of Judæa. They have, all of them, a pungent smell, which[1056] draws tears from the eyes, those of Cyprus more particularly, and those of Cnidos the least of all. In all of them the body is composed of a cartilage of an unctuous[1057] nature. The variety known as the setanian is the smallest of them all, with the exception of the Tusculan[1058] onion, but it is sweet to the taste. The schistan[1059] and the Ascalonian kinds are used for storing. The schistan onion is left during the winter with the leaves on; in the spring it is stripped of them, upon which offsets make their appearance at the same divisions as the leaves; it is to this circumstance that this variety owes its name. Taking the hint from this fact, it is recommended to strip the other kinds of their leaves, to make them bulb all the better, instead of running to seed.
The Ascalonian onion is of a peculiar nature, being barren in some measure in the root; hence it is that the Greeks have recommended it to be reproduced from seed, and not from roots: the transplanting, too, they say, should be done later in the spring, at the time the plant germinates, the result being that it bulbs with all the greater rapidity, and hastens, as it were, to make up for lost time; great dispatch, however, is requisite in taking it up, for when ripe it rots with the greatest rapidity. If propagated from roots, it throws out a long stalk, runs rapidly to seed, and dies.