KITCHEN GARDENING UNDER ELIZABETH AND JAMES I. 141 



eaten in various ways, roasted, sopped in wine, or cooked with 

 prunes, and conserves were made of them. They were sometimes 

 called Skirrets of Peru. Parkinson names a third plant in his 

 list of potatoes " Potatos of Canada." " We in England, frome 

 some ignorant and idle heads, have called them Artichokes of 

 Jerusalem, only because the root being boiled is in taste like the 

 bottom of an Artichoke head." " This plant has no similitude 

 . . . with an artichoke . . . neither came it from Jerusalem or 

 out of Asia, but out of America."* None of these authors make 

 any attempt to account for Helianthus tuberosus being called 

 " Jerusalem," but it can be explained, as the plant is a kind of 

 sunflower or " Girosole," of which latter word Jerusalem is a 

 corruption. Goodyer gives the history of its first introduction.-}- 

 " In anno 1617 I received two small roots thereof from Master 

 Franqueuill of London . . . the one I planted, the other I gave 

 to a friend, mine brought mee a pecke of roots, wherewith I 

 stored Hampshire." Of the use of these Parkinson writes, " The 

 Potatos of Canada are by reason of their great increasing, grown 

 to be so common here with us at London, that even the most 

 vulgar begin to despise them, whereas when they were first 

 received among us they were dainties for a Queen, but the 

 too-frequent use, especially being so plentiful and cheap, hath 

 rather bred a loathing than a liking of them." Goodyer also 

 classes them as " meat more fit for swine than men." 



Both the ordinary artichoke (Cynara Scolymus) and the 

 cardoon (Cynara Cardunculus) were grown, but the latter were 

 never as popular in England as they were abroad, probably 

 because "we cannot yet find the true manner of dressing them,, 

 that our country may take delight therein. "J The artichokes 

 grown in England were considered the best, and plants were 

 exported to Italy, France, and the Low Countries. 



Greater attention was paid to the culture of melons. All 

 gardening books give instructions for growing them, apparently 

 without great success, for Parkinson is honest enough to say, 

 " Muske melons have been begun to be nursed up, but of late 



* Johnson's Edition of Gerard's Herbal, 1633. f Ibid. 



% Parkinson. "i oz. of Cardone " seed in 1761 cost is. ^Household 

 Accounts, Stonor. 



