2 ASPARAGUS 
vated in Italy for the support of the vines, and that 
they should be burned in the spring of the third year, 
as the ashes would act as a manure to the future crop. 
He also recommends that the plants be renewed after 
eight or nine years. 
The usual method of preparing asparagus pursued 
by the Roman cooks was to select the finest sprouts 
and to dry them. When wanted for the table they 
were put in hot water and cooked a few minutes. To 
this practice is owing one of Emperor Augustus’s 
favorite sayings: ‘‘ Cztzus quam asparagt coguentur”’ 
(Do it quicker than you can cook asparagus). 
While the indigenous asparagus has been used from 
time immemorial as a medicine by Gauls, Germans, 
and Britons, its cultivation and use as a vegetable was 
only made known to the people by the invading 
Roman armies. But in the early part of the sixteenth 
century it was mentioned among the cultivated garden 
vegetables, and Leonard Meager, in his ‘‘ English 
Gardener,’’ published in 1683, informs us that in 
his time the London market was well supplied with 
‘* forced’’ asparagus. 
The medicinal virtues formerly attributed to as- 
paragus comprise a wide range. ‘The roots, sprouts, 
and seeds were used as medicine. The fresh roots are 
diuretic, perhaps owing to the immediate crystalizable 
principle, ‘‘ asparagine,’’ which is said to be sedative 
in the dose of a few grains. A syrup made of the 
young shoots and an extract of the roots has been 
recommended as a sedative in heart affections, and the 
species diuretica—a mixture of asparagus, celery, pars- 
ley, holly, and sweet fennel—was a favorite preparation 
