The chick-pea[261] is naturally salt,[262] for which reason it is apt to scorch the ground, and should only be sown after it has been steeped a day in water. This plant presents considerable differences in reference to size, colour,[263] form, and taste. One variety resembles in shape a ram’s head, from which circumstance it has received the name of “arietinum;” there are both the white and the black arietinum. There is also the columbine chick-pea, by some known as the “pea of Venus;” it is white, round, and smooth, being smaller than the arietinum, and is employed in the observances of the night festivals or vigils. The chicheling vetch,[264] too, is a diminutive kind of chick-pea, unequal and angular, like[265] the pea. The chick-pea that is the sweetest in flavour is the one that bears the closest resemblance to the fitch; the pod in the black and the red kinds is more firmly closed than in the white ones. CHAP. 33.—THE KIDNEY-BEAN. The pod of the chick-pea is rounded, while in other leguminous plants it is long and broad, like the seed which it contains; in the pea, again, it is of a cylindrical form. In the case of the kidney-bean[266] it is usual to eat the pod together with the seed. This last may be sown in all kinds of soils indifferently, between the ides of October[267] and the calends of November.[268] As soon as ever the leguminous plants begin to ripen, they ought to be plucked, for the pods will very soon open and the seed fall out, in which case it is very difficult to find: the same is the case, too, with the lupine. But before we pass on to the lupine, it will be as well to make some mention of the rape.[269] CHAP. 34. (13.)—THE RAPE.