324 AGRICULTURE ON THE PACIFIC SLOPE 

 FRUIT VEGETABLES (NOT SWEET) 



Among cooking vegetables in which the fruit is the 

 part eaten, the tomato is probably the most used in the 

 United States. It is a native of Peru, but its fruit, 

 when it is wild or has long escaped from cultivation, is 

 a red berry not much larger than a marble. By culti- 

 vation it has been enormously enlarged. When first 

 cultivated the fruit was Ifottish and full of green, 

 hard walls, but these have now been done away with, 

 so that our large tomatoes are much more soft and 

 juicy than the small fruit of the wild plant. 



The seed is sown in boxes, and the seedlings set out when 

 a few inches high. The first flowers usually do not bear 

 fruit, but fall off; later in the season most of them set. The 

 leaves have a disagreeable scent, are sticky, and probably 

 poisonous when eaten. Not over fifty years ago the fruit also 

 was thought to be poisonous by some people. Tomatoes 

 are now eaten all the world over; raw, cooked, or as sauce 

 (catsup) . 



The eggplant (a native of southwestern Asia) is closely 

 related to the tomato and potato, and has been long known, 

 as it supplies food in almost desert regions. 



On the Pacific Coast it is mostly of a purple tint, and 

 of the size of a small melon. The smaller sizes are more 

 peppery in taste than the larger ones, and on that account 

 are liked best by some people. 



The same is true of the peppers, of which the large " bell 

 peppers " are a good salad or cooking vegetable. The 

 smaller kinds, some of which are of the size of a marble only 



