292 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HTSTORY SOCIETY, 1890. 



Cucumis Meh is the true melon ; it is the Batikh of Egypt which 

 was so much regretted by the Jews in the wilderness ; it was culti- 

 vated by the Greeks and Romans. The melons of Bokhara and 

 Persia are famous ; the Emperor Baber is said to have shed tears 

 over a melon of Turkistan which was sent to him in India. The 

 Arabs, who also call it Batikh, believe that it is one of the fruits of 

 Paradise. We do not meet with melons of this quality in India, but 

 a variety, utilissimus, much like a cucumber, is cultivated all over the 

 country, it is called Tavashi in Marathi. 



C. sativus is the true cucumber ; as this fruit is so well known, it is 

 hardly necessary to say more about it, but I may remark that the 

 linest flavored cucumbers in the Konkan are those grown upon hilly 

 ground ; the cucumbers of Malabar Hill, for instance, are much 

 esteemed in Bombay. To fully appreciate the flavour of a cucumber 

 it should be eaten young with salt and pepper only. 



The genus Citrullus affords us the bitter, purgative colocynth 

 fruit, so common on the plains of the Deccan — in Sanskrit Indravaruni 

 and Vishala, and in Marathi Kwrurwndavan ; but from this very 

 unpromising source have been obtained by cultivation the water- 

 melon, Citrullus vulgaris (in Marathi Kalingad), and the excellent 

 vegetable known as Dilpasand, which, when young and fresh, is 

 little inferior to the vegetable marrow. Of the water-melon we have 

 a sweet and a bitter kind ; the latter is the Citrullus amarus of 

 authors, and has much of the properties of the parent colocynth. 

 There are many cultivated varieties of the sweet water-melon ; thoso 

 o-rown about Bombay are much infei'ior to the produce of hot and 

 dry climates, such as the coast of the Persian Gulf, where a slice of 

 this fruit, after a few minutes' exposure to the hot air of the Garma- 

 sir, is a luxury equal to the most delicious water ice. This melon 

 is the Batikh-el-Hind or " Indian melon " of the Arabs and the 

 Hindmoanah of the Persians. 



Cucurbita maxima is the common gourd ; C. moschata, the musk 

 melon ; and C. Pepo, the pumpkin. These gourds are all cultivated 

 in India. ( '. maxima is said to be a native of the Levant, and often 

 attains to an enormous size, 240 lbs. are on record ; it is the Potiron 

 of the French and the Lai Dudhiya, Tamarabhopala or Dltaii'/ar of 

 the Marathis. ( ' Pepo, which bears the same Indian names, is said to 



