THE FRENCH, NEW ZEALAND, AND PERENNIAL SPINACH. 65? 



a row, containing both male and female plants. When the female blossoms 

 are set, the male plants should be pulled up. The seed will keep four 

 years. 



SUBSECT. II. Orache, or French Spinach. 



1451. The orache, or French spinach, A triplex hortensis L., is a cheno- 

 podiaceous polygamous annual, growing to the height of three feet or four 

 feet, a native of Tartary, and in cultivation as a spinach plant from the be- 

 ginning of the sixteenth century. The leaves are used as in the common 

 spinach, to mix with those of sorrel, and sometimes also the tender points of 

 the shoots. There are three varieties, the white, syn. pale green-leaved, the 

 green-leaved, and the dark red-leaved. An ounce of seed will sow a drill of 

 one hundred feet in length ; and it comes up in ten days or a fortnight. A 

 dozen or tw r o of plants placed two feet apart every way, in rich soil, in an 

 open situation, kept moderately moist, will afford gatherings two or three 

 times a week during the whole summer. The leaves ought to be taken 

 while they are tender, and the blossoms pinched off as fast as they appear. 

 The earliest crop may be sown in February, and for succession another sow- 

 ing may be made in June. One plant will afford abundance of seed, which 

 will keep two years. 



SUBSECT. III. New Zealand Spinach. 



1452. The New Zealand spinach, 'Tetragonia expansa H. K., is a ficoi- 

 daceous trailing annual, a native of New Zealand, growing freely in the open 

 garden during our summers, and suffering much less from drought than the 

 common spinach. It has been more or less in culture as a spinach plant 

 since the beginning of the present century ; but it is of inferior quality to 

 the common spinach, and even to the orache, or French spinach. The seed, 

 of which J oz. will be sufficient, may be sown on a gentle heat in March ; 

 it will come up in ten days, and the plants may be transplanted into small 

 pots and kept in a cold frame till the middle of May, when they may be 

 turned "out into the open garden, allowing each plant at least a square yard 

 for the extension of its trailing branches. Half a dozen plants are enough 

 for an ordinary- sized garden. The rest is routine. Seed may be saved in 

 fine seasons from plants in the open garden ; and in cold wet summers by 

 planting on dry rubbish, keeping a plant in a pot, or training one up a wall. 

 It will keep two years. 



SUBSECT. IV. Perennial Spinach. 



1453. The perennial spinach, Chenopodium Bonus Henricus JL. (An- 

 serine, jpr.) is a chenopodiaceous perennial, a native of Britain, in loamy 

 soils, and formerly cultivated in gardens for its leaves, which, when grown 

 in a rich soil on vigorous young plants, make a very succulent spinach. The 

 plant is easily propagated by division, and it also ripens seeds. In Lincoln- 

 shire it is said to be cultivated in preference to the common spinach. 



1454. The leaves of many of the annual indigenous chenopodiums may, doubt- 

 less, be used as spinach, when nothing better can be got ; as may those of the 

 Quin6a, Chenopodium Quinoa W., an annual, a native of Peru, and exten- 

 sively -cultivated there for its small white seeds. There are two varieties, 

 the green and the red-leaved ; they grow about the height of the orache, to 

 which they bear a very close general resemblance. 



