UMBELLIFEROUS TRIBE 65 



3-lobed ; involucres none. Plant biennial. The Parsnip is very frequent on 

 chalky or gravelly soils, and is abundant in many parts of the country, 

 growing on field borders, hedge banks, meadows, and sea cliffs. Its leaves 

 are of bright green, and in July, August, and September, it produces its 

 convex umbels of yellow flowers, Avhich are succeeded by oval fruits. It has, 

 when bruised, a strongly aromatic scent ; and its fruits, which seem full of 

 oil, mil, if tasted, leave a pungent flavour on the tongue ; the oil has been 

 expressed and used with success, in cases of intermittent fever. If we draw 

 from the soil its long spindle-shaped roots, we can have no doubt, from its 

 odour, that our plant has some affinity with the well-known edible Parsnip ; 

 and tough as it is in its wild state, that culinary vegetable is but the 

 cultivated variety of our native root. In its improved condition the root 

 is full of a pleasant farinaceous substance, too sweet in flavour to be uni- 

 versally relished, though highly nutritious. An old custom prevails of 

 eating this vegetable during Lent, and in the north of Scotland it forms the 

 daily meal of many a group of peasant children, who eat it with much satis- 

 faction when beaten up with milk, and whose sturdy frames and rosy cheeks 

 fully attest the wholesomeness of the diet. Gerarde says that, in his day, 

 good bread was made of the root ; and when this is slowly roasted in turf 

 ashes, it forms almost as pleasant a food as the roasted potato. The Parsnip 

 seems to have been more eaten in England in former years than now, and it 

 would still, doubtless, be much cultivated, but that the soil on which it 

 groAvs is well fitted for the more productive potato, which is more generally 

 liked as food. In the north of Ireland, an agreeable beverage is made from 

 Parsnip roots, brewed with hops, and a very fine spirit has been obtained by 

 distillation from this root. Parsnip wine too was some years ago made in 

 country places, but the writer, who drank of this beverage in early days, is 

 inclined to think that the wine owed much of the excellence of its flavour 

 to the other ingredients Avhich mingled with the root in its composition. 

 This Avine is still made in some other countries. Parsnips are sometimes 

 converted into a marmalade. 



The variety knoAvn as Coquaine Parsnip is very large, its root sometimes 

 running three or four feet into the soil, and attaining three or four inches in 

 diameter, while its mass of foliage looks at a distance almost like a shrub, 

 and proceeds from the whole crown of the root. This kind is extensively 

 planted in the Channel Isles as fodder for cattle ; but the smaller-rooted Siam 

 Parsnip is more tender, and better fitted than the others for human food. 

 It has been suggested that the excellence of the Alderney cow, for the 

 purposes of the dairy, may be in great measure OAving to its feeding so much 

 on Parsnips. 



A light, deep soil, free from stones, is requisite for the groAvth of this 

 root, and when in October the leaves at its summit are turning dull yellow, 

 and beginning to decay, then the roots are fit for use. It is not, hoAvever, 

 absolutely necessary to withdraAv them at that season from the soil, as they 

 are not, like the carrot, injured by the frost, and may safely remain in the 

 ground during winter. The French term the Parsnip Le Panais, the Germans 

 Die Pastimke. It is the Pinstemakel of the Dutch, the Pasternak of the 

 Russians, and the Pastinaca of the Spaniards and Italians. 



II.— 9 



