48 RuTA Baga culturk. [Part I. 



could see me overstocked, not with mouths, but with 

 food, owing to a little care in the cultivation of this in- 

 valuable root, he would, I am sure, have reason to be 

 convinced, that, if any farmer in the United States is 

 in want of food at this pinching season of the year, the 

 fault is neither in the soil nor in the climate. 



28. It is, therefore, of my mode of cultivating this 

 root on this Island that I mean, at present, to treat; 

 to whicli matter I shall add, in another Part of my 

 work, an account of my experiments as to the Maxgel. 

 WuRZEL, or Scarcity root ; though, as will be .seen, 

 I deem that root, except in particular cases, of very 

 inferior importance. The parsnip, the carrot, the cab- 

 bage, are all excellent in their kind and in their uses ; 

 but, as to these, I have not yet made, upon a scale 

 sufficiently large here, such experiments as would war- 

 rant me in speaking Avith any degree of confidence. Of 

 these, and other matters, I propose to treat in a future 

 Part, which I shall, probably, publish towards the lat- 

 ter end of this present year. 



29. The Ruta Baga is a sort of turnip well known 

 in the State of Ncav York, Avhere, under the name of 

 Jiussia turnip, it is used for the Table from February 

 to July. But, as it may be more of a stranger in other 

 parts of the country, it seems necessary to give it 

 enough of description to enable every reader to distin- 

 guish it from every other sort of turnip. 



30. The leaf of every other sort of turnip is of a 

 yellowish green, while the leaf of the Ruta Baga is of a 

 hlneish green, like the green of peas, when of nearly 

 their full size, or like the green of a young and thrifty 

 early Yorkshire cabbage. Hence it is, I suppose, that 

 some persons have called it the C'abbage-hirnip. But 

 the characteristics the most decidedly distinctive are 

 these : — that the outside of the bulb of the Ruta Baga is 

 of a greenish hue, mixed, towards the top, with a colour 

 bordering on a red, and, that the inside of the bulb, if 

 the sort be true and pure, is of a deep yellow, nearly as 

 deep as that of gold. 



