HORTICULTURE 327 



Sandwich Islands. It seems remarkable that any one inhabiting the Southern country should 

 be so ignorant of this common vegetable as to be at the trouble of importing it some thousands 

 of miles when it could be procured close at hand. The plant is known as the Tanyer, the 

 Eddo, and the Jabavi. As for its value as an esculent, the most that can be said of it is, that 

 it is a very poor substitute for the potato. There is, however, considerable difference in the 

 quality of the roots, some being very dry and mealy, others of a finer texture are very muci- 

 laginous ; of the first, the white ones are far preferable to the purple. The young shoots, or 

 rather buds — that is to say, the portion of involuted and blanched leaves that can be procured 

 from them shortly after they first sprout from the earth — when dressed like asparagus,, form 

 probably the most delicious vegetable that can be eaten. The French formerly cultivated it 

 for this purpose in Hayti, under the name of Chou caraibe, or Carribean cabbage. The 

 writer in the Florist says he knows of no plant which will produce more to the acre than this, 

 particularly if left in the ground for two years, when the whole soil appears to become one 

 solid mass of roots. 



The Ammabroma, or Sand-Food of Sonora. 



This new plant has recently been brought to notice by Mr. H. B. Gray, who was attached 

 to one of the recent explorations across the continent for the purpose of ascertaining the 

 practicability of constructing a railway to the Pacific. It is a parasitic plant, with a large and 

 fleshy root : a parasite which Professor Torrey, of New York, to whom Mr. Gray submitted 

 it for examination, finds to constitute " a new genus of the small group or family represented 

 by the little-known anomalous Corattophyllum of Kunth, and the Pholisma of Nuttall ; in the 

 floral sti-ucture and the scales more like the latter, from which it is distinguished by its 

 woolly, plumose calyx, and its singular cyathiform inflorescence." It was found in abundance 

 through a range of naked sand-hills skirting " Adair Bay," near the Gulf of California, fur- 

 nishing an isolated band of Papigo Indians with an important article of food. The fresh 

 plant is cooked by roasting upon hot coals, and resembles the sweet-potato in taste, hav- 

 ing much saccharine matter about it. It is likewise dried and mixed with less palatable 

 kinds of food, such as musquit, beans, &c. It is represented to be a very delicious vegetable ; 

 and could it be transplanted, Mr. Gray believes that it would constitute an important acqui- 

 sition to the table, probably not second in demand to the sweet-potato or asparagus. In the 

 opinion of Professor Torrey it cannot be grown elsewhere, unless the root of the shrub, which 

 is entirely under ground, &c, to which it attaches itself, can be transplanted. The name 

 given to this root is the Ammabroma Sonorce, which signifies the sand-food of Sonora. 



The Lawton Blackberry. 



At a recent meeting of the New York Farmers' Club, Mr. Field said he had been experi- 

 menting with the common bramble to see whether the improvements effected in the black- 

 berry by Secore, and carried into extensive operation by Lawton, were the result of change 

 in the soil and cultivation, or whether it could be traced to a peculiar variety of the bramble. 

 He took a plant from the woods, where it had grown in fine soil, and planted it in poor 

 soil, and yet it produced berries as large as Lawton's, although only a small crop. Several 

 berries measured four inches each in circumference. From his experiments he was convinced 

 that there were distinct varieties of the bramble, some of which were more favorable than 

 others to produce the fine fruit now grown by Lawton, and that it is to the variety, rather 

 than to either the soil or the cultivation, that the superiority is to be attributed. 



New Varieties of Currants. 



La Versaillaise, La Hative, and La Fertile, three varieties comparatively new, are well 

 worthy of cultivation. The first is the largest currant known — larger even than the Cherry 

 currant ; its bunches are very long. The second and third are well named, for La Hative is 

 as early as Knights Early Red, but with berries much larger ; and La Fertile is a most pro- 

 digious bearer, so that its leaves are hidden by its fruit. 



