IN  MODERN  GREECE.  95

which  is  not  unlike  that  of  blood,  and  which  has  even  pro-
cured for  the  species  the  name  of  Digitaria  sanguinalis.  In
the  same  manner  the  capricious  mediaeval  imagination  pro-
nounced liver-wort,  with  its  marbled  leaves,  a  sovereign
remedy  for  diseases  of  the  lungs, — organs  remarkable  for
their  marbled  appearance.
Dioscorides  is  quite  as  explicit  as  Pliny.  What  the  latter
names  Gramen,  he,  however,  calls  Agrostis.  After  having
particularised  the  nodosities  of  the  stem — a  feature  common
to  nearly  all  the  Graminaceae — he  describes  very  clearly  the
long  creeping  roots  put  forth  by  the  said  stem;  and
he  does  not  forget  to  mention  the  sugary  savour,  so  char-
acteristic of  the  rhizomes  (§''£«•£  yXyxs/'ag)  of  the  Triticum
repens*  Theophrastus  confines  himself  to  indicating  the
Agrostis  as  a  herb  which  infests  the  fields.t

The  Cynodon  dactylon  is,  at  the  present  day,  very  common
in  Greece,  where  it  is  specially  partial  to  low  grounds,  which
are  somewhat  damp  and  sandy.  The  inhabitants  call  it
Agriada,  a  name  derived  from  «7£/or,  "wild."  But  if  we
may  believe  Fraas,  the  author  of  a  Flora  Classic^  the  genuine
dog's-tooth,  Triticum  repens,  is,  on  the  contrary,  very  rare  in
the  land  of  Socrates.  This  is  a  curious  fact,  if  a  fact,  for
geographical  botany.
Throughout  the  Middle  Ages,  and  down  to  the  eighteenth
century,  were  confounded,  under  the  generic  name  of  Gramina,

*  Dioscorides,  iv.  30.
t  Theophrastus,  "  Historia  Plantarum,"  i.  10  ;  xi.  2,  4.
96  THE  AD  VENT  OF  SPRING.
or  grasses,  the  most  diversely-featured  herbs,  including  the
dog's-tooth.  Tabernsemontanus,  Dodonne,  Mathiole,  Jean
and  Gaspard  Bauhin,  were  the  first  to  attempt  the  clearing
of  a  path  through  this  intricate  wilderness.  They  eulogised,
at  the  same  time,  the  emollient  properties  of  the  dog's-tooth.
