310 VEGETABLE SUBSTANCES. 



MONK RHUBARB Rheum rhaponticum is also 

 a native of Asia, but of what particular part is not 

 known, neither is the time of its introduction ascer- 

 tained ; we find it mentioned by Tusser so early as 

 1573, as being then cultivated in England. 



The leaves of this species are blunt and smooth, 

 with red veins ; the footstalks have also a red tinge, 

 they have a groove or furrow on their upper sides, and 

 are rounded at the edges. 



The HYBRID RHUBARB Rheum hybridum is 

 a native of more northern parts of Asia than the others, 

 and is of more recent introduction into Britain. It 

 was first cultivated in this country by Dr Fothergill 

 in 1778, but it did not come into general use as a 

 culinary vegetable till several years after, having been 

 introduced in our kitchen-gardens for this purpose 

 about thirty years back. This plant is of a much 

 more lively green than the former species. The 

 leaves are slightly heart-shaped and very large, being, 

 in favourable soils and under good culture, sometimes 

 as much as four feet in length, including the footstalk. 

 In the Gardener's Magazine for February, 1829, we 

 find a notice of a plant of this species, the leaves of 

 which attained to great dimensions. One leaf being 

 cut, with its petiole, was found to weigh four pounds. 

 The circumference of the leaf, not including its foot- 

 stalk, measured twenty-one feet three inches ; its 

 diameter, three feet ten inches ; length of leaf, in- 

 cluding the petiole, five feet two inches, and length of 

 petiole, one foot four inches. The stalks of the 

 hybrid are much more succulent, as well as larger, 

 than those of the Monk Rhubarb, which, therefore, 

 cause it to be the preferable species for cultivation, 

 although Hheutn. undulation, called by gardeners 

 Buck's Rh., and the Elford Rh., has been found the 

 finest in flavour. 



Rhubarb is very easily cultivated, and though it 



