184 PLIOT'S NATFIUL HISTOBY. [Book XIX. 



called from the periods of sowing ; although sometimes we 

 find beet sown in June even. This is a plant, too, that is 

 sometimes transplanted ; and it thrives all the better, like the 

 lettuce, if the roots are well covered with manure, in a moist 

 soil. Beet is mostly eaten 24 with lentils and beans ; it is pre- 

 pared also in the same way as cabbage, with mustard more 

 particularly, the pungency of which relieves its insipidity. 

 Medical men are of opinion that beet is a more unwholesome 25 

 vegetable than cabbage ; hence it is that I never remember 

 s.eeing it served at table. Indeed, there are some persons who 

 scruple to taste it even, from a conviction that it is a food 

 suitable only for persons of a robust constitution. 



Beet is a vegetable with twofold characteristics, partaking 

 of the nature of the cabbage in its leaves and resembling a 

 bulb in the root ; that which grows to the greatest breadth 

 being the most highly esteemed. This plant, like the lettuce, 

 is made to grow to head by putting a light weight upon it the 

 moment it begins to assume its proper colour. Indeed, there 

 is no garden plant that grows to a larger head than this, as it 

 sometimes spreads to a couple of feet in breadth, the nature of 

 the soil contributing in a very considerable degree to its size : 

 those found in the territory of Circeii attain the largest size. 

 Some persons 26 think that the best time for sowing beet is 

 when the pomegranate is in flower, and are of opinion that it 

 ought to be transplanted as soon as it has thrown out five 

 leaves. There is a singular difference if indeed it really 

 exists between the two varieties of beet, the white kind 

 being remarkable for its purgative qualities, and the black 

 being equally astringent. When wine in the vat has been 

 deteriorated by assuming a flavour like 27 that of cabbage, its 

 original flavour is restored, it is said, by plunging beet leaves 

 into it. 



24 It was only the leaf of beet, and not the root, that was eaten by the 

 ancients. From Martial, B. xiii. Epig. 10, we learn that the leaves were 

 preserved in a mixture of wine and pepper. 



* 5 Though not positively unwholesome, the leaves would form an insipid 

 dish, that would not agree with all stomachs. Galen says that it cannot 

 be eaten in great quantities with impunity, but Diphilus the physician, as 

 quoted by Athenaeus, B. ix. c. 3, says the reverse. Some MSS. read here 

 "inuocentiorem," " more harmless." 



26 Columella says the same> De Re Rust. B. xi. c. 3. 



27 Fee would seem to render this, " when wine has been spoiled by cab- 

 bage leaves being mixed with it." 



