254 



PAS 



THE UNIVERSAL HERBAL; 



PAS 



dom well-tasted ; nor are they good for much in the spring, 

 after they are shot out again. To preserve them for this 

 season, dig them up in the beginning of February, and bury 

 them in the sand in a dry place, where they will remain good 

 until the middle of April, or later. To save seeds, make 

 choice of some of the longest, straightest, and largest roots, 

 and plant them two feet asunder, where they are defended 

 from strong south and south-west winds, for the stems grow 

 to a great height ; keep them clear from weeds, and, if the 

 season should prove dry, water them twice a week. At the 

 end of August, or the beginning of September, the seeds will 

 be ripe ; then carefully cut the umbels, and spread them upon 

 a coarse cloth for two or three days to dry ; after which beat 

 out the seeds, and put them up for use. Never trust to the 

 seeds that are more than a year old, for they will seldom 

 grow beyond that age. The leaves are dangerous to handle, 

 especially in a morning, while the dew remains upon them. 

 Gardeners who have been drawing up Carrots from among 

 Parsneps while their leaves are wet with dew, with the sleeves 

 of their shirts turned up to their shoulders, often have their 

 arms covered with large blisters, full of scalding liquor, 

 which have proved very troublesome for several days. To 

 cultivate Parsneps for the farmer, sow the seed in autumn, 

 soon after it is ripe ; by which means the plants will come 

 on early the following spring, and get strong before the 

 weeds can grow so as to injure them. The young plants 

 never suffer materially through the severity of the seasons. 

 The best soil for them is a rich deep loam; next to this is a 

 sand ; or they will thrive well in a black gritty soil ; but 

 will never pay for cultivating in stone, brash, gravel, or clay 

 soils ; and they are always the largest where the staple is 

 the deepest. If the soil be proper, thpy fin not require much 

 manure: a very good crop has been obtained, for three suc- 

 cessive years, without any. Forty cart-loads of sand laid 

 on an acre of very stiff loam, and ploughed in, has answered 

 very well. Sow the seed in drills eighteen inches distant, 

 that the plants may be horse or hand hoed : they will be 

 more luxuriant if they have a second hoeing, and are care- 

 fully earthed, so as not to cover the leaves. If land cannot 

 be got in proper condition to receive the seed in autumn, 

 sow a plat in the garden, or the corner of a field, and trans- 

 plant thence at the end of April, or early in May. The 

 plants must be carefully drawn, and the land that is to receive 

 them well pulverized by harrowing and rolling. When it 

 is thus in order, open a furrow six or eight inches deep, and 

 lay the plants in it regularly at the distance of ten inches 

 or a foot, taking care not to let the root be bent, and that 

 the plant stand upright after the earth is closed about it, 

 which should be done immediately by persons following the 

 planter with a hoe, and who must be attentive not to cover 

 the leaves. Open another furrow eighteen inches distant 

 from the last, plant it as before, and so proceed till the field 

 is completely cropped. When any weeds appear, hoe the 

 ground, and earth the plants. Dibbling, in Parsneps, is a 

 bad method, as the ground thereby becomes so bound as 

 not easily to admit the lateral fibres, with which the root 

 of this plant abounds, to fix or work in the earth, on which 

 account the roots never attain their proper size. With 

 attention to the soil, the season for sowing, cleaning, and 

 earthing the plants, and raising the seeds from the largest 

 and best Parsneps, there is no doubt that the crop would 

 answer much better than a crop of Carrots. They are equal 

 to them, if not superior, in fatting pigs ; for they make the 

 flesh white, and the animals eat them with more satisfaction. 

 Clean washed, and sliced among bran, horses eat them 

 greedily, and thrive with them ; nor do they heat horses, or, 



like corn, till them with disorders. In France, and in our 

 islands adjoining to it, Parsneps are held in high esteem both 

 for cattle and swine. In liritany this crop is said to be little 

 inferior in value to wheat. Milch cows, fed with it in win- 

 ter, give as much and as good milk, and yield butter as 

 well-flavoured, with Parsneps, as with grass in May or 

 June. 



3. Pastinaca Opoponax ; Rough Parsnep. Leaves pinnate, 

 and bipinnate ; leaflets gashed at the base and front. Root 

 perennial, as thick as the human arm, yellow, branched; 

 the branches an inch or an inch and half in thickness, a foot 

 and half in length, tubercled, with a corky bark ; stem from 

 three feet to the height of a man, the thickness of a finger, 

 striated, covered at the base, like the Ferns, with scariose 

 membranous scales, in other parts very smooth and shining, 

 angular at top, especially the branches. The umbelliferous 

 branches are very smooth. The universal umbels have usu- 

 ally seven or eight rays, an inch long, of a yellowish green 

 colour ; fruits flat, with the rim thicker, three or four lines 

 in diameter, and a little longer; juice yellow, bearing no 

 marks of a resinous or aromatic principle. It flows out 

 where the leaf or stalks are broken. In the warmer regions 

 of the East, of which this plant is a native, the juice concretes 

 into a gum-resin called Opoponax. It is obtained by means 

 of incisions made at the bottom of the stalk ; and is imported 

 from Turkey and the East Indies, sometimes in little round 

 drops or ears, but more commonly in irregular lumps, of a 

 reddish yellow colour, speckled with white on the outside, 

 internally paler, and frequently variegated with large white 

 pieces. This gum-resin has a strong disagreeable smell, and 

 a bitter, acrid % somewhat nauseous taste. It readily forms 

 a milky liquor with water by rubbing ; and this on standing 

 deposits a portion of resinous matter, and becomes yellowish: 

 to rectified spirit it yields a gold-coloured tincture, which 

 tastes and smells strongly of the drug. Water distilled from 

 it is impregnated with its smell, but no essential oil is obtained 

 in the operation. Opoponax has been long esteemed for its 

 attenuating, deobstruent, and aperient virtues ; but as it is 

 commonly prescribed in combination with other medicines, 

 these qualities are by no means ascertained, nor do its sen- 

 sible qualities indicate it to be a medicine of much power. 

 Dr. Cullen classes it with the antispasmodics ; it is however 

 less fetid than Galbanum, though more so than Ammoniacum. 

 It has been commonly given in hypochondriacal affections, 

 visceral obstructions, menstrual suppressions, and asthmas, 

 especially when connected with a phlegmatic habit of body. 



Pasture Ground, is of two sorts: the one is low meadow 

 land, which is often overflowed ; and the other is upland, 

 which lies high and dry. The former will produce a much 

 greater quantity of hay than the latter, and will not require 

 manuring or dressing so often; but then the hay produced 

 on the upland is much preferable to the other, as is also the 

 meat which is fed in the upland more valued than that which 

 is fatted in rich meadows, though the latter will make the 

 fatter and larger cattle, as is seen in those brought from the 

 low rich lands in Lincolnshire. But where people are nice 

 in their meat, they will give a much larger price for such as 

 has been fed on the downs, or in short upland pastures, 

 than for the other, which is much larger. Besides this, dry 

 pastures have this superiority over the meadows, that they 

 may be fed on all the winter, and are not so subject to poach 

 in wet weather, nor will there be so many bad weeds pro- 

 duced ; which are great advantages, and do in a great mea- 

 sure recompense for the smallness of the crop. The first im- 

 provement of upland pasture, .is by fencing it, and dividing 

 it into small fields of four, five, six, eight, or ten acres each, 



