Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/46

36 from che epistle to the gospel side of the altar. The author of the Graal conception meant by graal, or gradale, not the sacred dish (escuelle), but the mysterious book revealed to the supposed hermit of 717, in which he finds the history of the escuelle. Robert de Boron, mistaking this, transfers the name to the dish, and connects it with gre (gratus, gratia) on account of the inward solace connected with it (see Romans de la T. R., i. 143). The word rapidly became popular in the sense of bowl, or shallow cup, so that Helinand (1204) could say, &quot;Dicitur vulgari nomine graalz, quia grata et acceptabilis est in ea comedenti.&quot; This etymology is the same as Boron s. The older French word greel, meaning service-book (Ducange, article &quot; Gradale &quot;), was displaced by the new graal or greal. On the other hand, M. Fauriel derives graal from an old Provencal word for a cup, grazal. But this grazal, according to the article in Ducange, seems to be of Armorican origin ; anyhow M. Fauriel has not proved its use in the sense of cup at a period earlier than the rise of the Graal legend.

4. The spread and ascendency to which the Graal con ception rapidly attained in all Christian countries made the creations of Arthurian romance the delight of all cultivated minds, from Caerleon to Venice, and from Iceland to the Straits of Gibraltar. From England, which we must regard as the land of its origin, the Graal legend at once passed to France, and found an enthusiastic and capable interpreter in Robert or Robiers de Boron. This Boron was no Englishman of Nottinghamshire, as some English writers have pretended, but, as Paulin Paris conclusively proves, a French poet of the county of Montbeliard in the region of the Vosges. Chrestien de Troyes in his Percival (written before 1191, for it is dedicated to Count Philip of Flanders who died in that year), gives in a metrical dress the legend of Percival, one of the knights of the round table, under the transformation which the introduction of the Graal conception had effected. The continuations of the poem, by Denet and Manessier, come down to about 1240. The famous Mid-German poem of Parzival, by Wolfram von Eschenbach, which appeared near the begin ning of the 13th century, is founded partly on Chrestien s Percival, but partly also on some other, perhaps Prove^al, source, which is now lost. A rude English metrical version of the French prose romance of the Saint Graal, by one Harry Lonelich, dating from the reign of Henry VI., has been recently edited by Mr Furnivall for the Roxburghe Club. Flemish, Icelandic, and Welsh reproductions of the Graal romances have been found to exist. One of the first employments of the printing press in England, France, and Germany was to multiply poems or romances embodying this legend. Hence Caxton printed for Sir Thomas Malory (1485) The Historie of King Arthur and his Noble Knightes, a version in English prose of the French romances of Merlin, Lancelot, Tristan, the Quete du Saint Graal, and Mart Artur, or at any rate based upon them. An early French edition of the Tristan, of which there is a copy in the British Museum, is dated 1489. Lancelot du Lac was printed at Paris in 1513; and not long afterwards editions of the Tristan and other portions of the Arthur cycle, always as interpenetrated by the Graal legend, appeared both in Italy and Spain (Schulz s Essay, p. 114).

 GRAINS OF PARADISE,, or (, Paradieskörner;, Graines de Paradis, Maniguette), the semina cardamomi majoris or piper melegueta of , are the s of Amomum Melegueta, Roscoe, a -like of the  Zingiberaceæ, which is a native of  , and of  and  in the , is cultivated in , and may with ease be grown in  in. The has a branched horizontal rhizome; smooth, nearly sessile, alternate, with the blade oblong-lanceolate; large, white, pale pink, or purplish s; and an ovate-oblong , ensheathed in bracts, which is of a scarlet colour when fresh, and reaches under  a length of 5 es. The s are contained in the pulp of the, are commonly -shaped and bluntly , are about 1  in , and have a glossy dark-brown , with a  light-coloured  caruncle at the base, and a white. They contain, according to Flückiger and Hanbury, 0·3 per cent. of a faintly yellowish neutral, having an tic, not , and a  at 15·5  of 0·825, and giving on analysis the  ₂₀₃₂, or ₁₀₁₆+ ₁₀₁₆; also 5·83 per cent. of an intensely, , brown. Grains of paradise were formerly officinal in s, and in the  and succeeding centuries were used as a  and a, the  known as  being flavoured with them and with  and. In they were employed among the ingredients of the twenty-four  s which were the ancient -favour of the  of, ordained to be carried to  by the  of the  of  (Johnston and Church, Chem. of Common Life, p.355, ). Grains of paradise were in past times from  to the  s of the, to be  for. They are now ed almost exclusively from the. The amount received by in  was upwards of 760  Grains of paradise are to some extent used in, but for the most part  to give a  to  s, , and s. By 56 Geo.III. c.58, no or dealer in  shall have in his possession or use grains of paradise, under a  of 200 for each offence; and no  shall sell the same to a  under a  of 500. They are, however, devoid of any injurious action, and are much esteemed as a  by the  of.

1em  GRAM, or, called also ian , or Gram (, chaná&thinsp;; , chholá&thinsp;; ,  ; , ), an aceous, annual,  , the Cicer arietinum of , so named from the resemblance of its  to a 's , is a native of the south of  and. Its are, with ovate, equal, and  leaflets ; the flowers are , and of a bluish-purple colour, and bloom in India from  to ; and the pods have a length of 1 to 1½ inch, and contain either one or two somewhat pointed and commonly pale yellow seeds, about 3 lines long. Gram is largely cultivated in the East, where the seeds are eaten raw, or cooked and prepared in various ways, both in their ripe and unripe condition, and when roasted and ground are made to subserve the same purposes as ordinary. In Europe the seeds are used as an ingredient in s. They contain, in 100 parts without s, ous substances 22·7, 3·76,  63·18,  matters 2·6 parts, with  (Forbes Watson, quoted in Parkes's Hygiene). The liquid which exudes from the glandular hairs clothing the leaves and stems of the plant, more