VEGETABLE AND FRUIT MARKETS. 363 



hops are said to last twelve years, the filberts thirty, and after 

 that, the apples and pears require the whole ground.&quot; 



The vegetables grown for table use are many of them in 

 appearance of the finest kinds. The potatoes grown in England 

 are in general of a superior quality, though I think them inferior 

 to the potatoes grown in Nova Scotia. In Nova Scotia, they 

 have not only the advantage of a climate as cool as that of 

 England, but likewise of a virgin soil, which circumstances 

 seem particularly favorable both to the growth and the quality 

 of the potato ; and nothing of the kind, which I have ever eaten, 

 is equal to a fine Nova Scotia potato. In our old soils, sur 

 charged with manure, the potatoes are always inferior in quality. 

 In Ireland, deemed of all other countries the adopted home of 

 the potato, I was seldom able to find one that, was even eatable. 

 This arose, however, not from the quality of the root, but from 

 the mode of cooking the Irish always desiring, to use their own 

 expression, &quot;to have a stone in the middle ; &quot; so that the aim of 

 the cook was only to boil, or rather scald, the outside of the 

 potato, and leave the inside as hard as when it went into the 

 pot. The advantage of this, as gravely stated to me, was that 

 they were longer in digestion, and therefore gave more support. 

 This may be sound philosophy in Ireland, where the stomachs 

 of the poor find an equal difficulty in getting, as they do in 

 keeping what they get. It would be inhuman to treat the 

 extreme destitution of these poor wretches with any levity ; but 

 I found this mode of cooking prevailing also at the tables of the 

 rich and noble ; and after seeing such an abuse of one of the 

 most useful and nutritious plants which come out of the earth, 

 I was half inclined to advise them to try a few granite pebbles 

 of a size to pass through a McAdam ring, and see whether they 

 would not serve the digestive organs still longer. It was a 

 curiosity to me in London, likewise, to see them selling in the 

 market, by the quart, the small, not half-grown, not quarter- 

 grown potatoes, not even so large as cherries, and many not 

 larger than peas ; and these were bought up as luxuries. I 

 should quite as soon think of sitting down to a dish of boiled 

 bullets, or duck-shot ; and I should suppose with almost equal 

 chance of nourishment. If it were such potatoes only, at which 

 Cobbett launched his anathemas, one would not be surprised at 

 his indignation. 



