320 VEGETABLE SUBSTANCES. 



place in the herb compartment of the kitchen-garden. 

 This is a trailing evergreen, of still smaller growth 

 than the common kind, and is remarkable lor its 

 smell, which resembles that of the rind of lemons, 

 whence its distinctive name. Both the species thrive 

 best in a dry soil. They are propagated most ge- 

 nerally from seed ; but they can likewise be multiplied 

 by slips, or by parting the roots. 



This herb is used in many savoury preparations. 

 It was employed by the Romans to give its peculiar 

 aromatic flavour to cheese a practice pursued like- 

 wise with some flowers and seeds of other plants. 

 This manner of preparing cheese was still con- 

 tinued during the middle ages. We collect this 

 from an anecdote told of Charlemagne, who, travel- 

 ling unattended, arrived at a bishop's palace. It 

 was unfortunately a fast-day, and the only fare 

 which the bishop would set before his royal guest, 

 was bread and some choice cheese ; this the king did 

 not appear particularly to relish, picking out with his 

 knife small specks, which he mistook for unsound 

 parts, but which, in fact, were parsley seeds. The 

 prelate ventured to hint that he was throwing away 

 the best parts of the cheese ; when the monarch 

 tasted it, and liked it so much, that he requested the 

 bishop to send him an annual supply of this excellent 

 flavoured curd ; and, lest the cheese-merchant might 

 by chance pack cheeses without any admixture of 

 seeds, the king desired that they might always be 

 cut in two, in order to ascertain the fact, and be then 

 fastened together again with a skewer. * The moun- 

 taineers, in the canton of Claris, in Switzerland, 

 prepare a cheese known by the name of Schabzieger, 

 which is readily distinguished by its peculiar marbled 

 appearance and aromatic flavour ; these are com- 



* Foreign Review, and Continental Miscellany. 



