86 ESCULENT ROOTS. 



directly from the garden, whenever the frost will admit of 

 their removal. A portion of the crop should, however, be 

 taken up in autumn, and stored in the cellar, like other 

 roots ; or, which is perhaps preferable, packed in earth or 

 sand. Roots remaining in the ground may be drawn for use 

 till April, or until the plants have begun to send up their 

 stalks for flowering. 



Seeds, production and quantity. For the production 

 of seeds, allow a few plants to remain during the winter in 

 the open ground where they were sown. They will blossom 

 in June and July. When fully developed, the stem is about 

 three feet in height, cylindrical, and branching. The flowers 

 are large, of a very rich violet-purple, and expand only by 

 day and in comparatively sunny weather. As the flowers 

 are put forth in gradual succession, so the heads of seeds 

 are ripened at intervals, and should be cut as they assume a 

 brownish color. 



The seeds are brownish, lighter or darker as they are 

 less or more perfectly matured, long and slender, fur- 

 rowed and rough on the sides, tapering to a long, smooth 

 point at the top, often somewhat bent or curved, and measure 

 about five eighths of an inch in length. They will keep four 

 years. 



An ounce contains three thousand two hundred seeds, and 

 will sow a row eighty feet in length. Some cultivators put 

 this amount of seed into a drill of sixty feet ; but if the 

 seed is of average quality, and the season ordinarily favor- 

 able, one ounce of seed will produce an abundance of plants 

 for eighty or a hundred feet. 



Use. The roots are prepared in various forms ; but, 

 when simply boiled in the manner of beets and carrots, the 

 flavor is sweet and delicate. The young flower-stalks, if cut 

 in the spring of the second year and dressed like asparagus, 

 resemble it in taste, and make an excellent dish. 



