Wrexham.
_Mummy Wheat._--As you have afforded space for a Query on "Wild Oats,"
you will not, I hope, deny me a corner for one on Mummy Wheat.
In the year 1840, a letter appeared in _The Times_, signed "Martin
Farquhar Tupper," which detailed minutely the sowing, growing, and
gathering of some mummy wheat. Mr. Tupper, it seems, had received the
grains of wheat from Mr. Pettigrew, who had them from Sir Gardner
Wilkinson, by whom they were found on opening an ancient tomb in the
Thebaid. Mr. Tupper took great pains to secure the identity of the seed,
and had no doubt that he had gathered the product of a grain preserved
since the time of the Pharaohs. The long vitality of seeds has been a
popular belief; I was therefore surprised to find that that interesting
fact is now pronounced to be no fact at all. It appears, in _The
Year-Book of Facts for 1852_, that Prof. Henslowe stated to the British
Association, that "the instances of plants growing from seeds found in
mummies were all erroneous." Can any one tell me how this has been
proved?