188 GARDENING. 



zier and his followers think that the most vigorous 

 plants, of all species and kinds, are the best ; and 

 accordingly prefer new seeds, because more likely 

 to produce such than old ones : while, on the other 

 hand, their opponents maintain that plants may have 

 too much vigour as well as too little ; and that, 

 whenever an excess of vigour exists, according to 

 all vegetable analogy, it shows itself in the produc- 

 tion of stems and leaves, and not in that of flowers 

 and fruits ; whence they conclude that old cucum- 

 ber seeds (like those of all the rest of the cucurbi- 

 taceae family) are better than new, because less vig- 

 orous. The best practical use to be made of this 

 controversy is to sow old seeds in the spring, when 

 vegetation is most powerful, and new ones in July, 

 when it begins to abate. 



GARLIC (Allium). A genus of plants found grow- 

 ing spontaneously in very different and even oppo- 

 site climates. Jollyclerc says it grows without 

 care in Sicily and in the south of France, and the 

 continuator of Cook's Journal informs us that it was 

 found in the open fields and forests of Kamschatka. 

 Its species are many. Lamarck mentions thirty- 

 nine, and Wildenow fifty-eight, the principal of 

 which are the onion, the leek, the eschalot, and the 

 cive. 



The onion is the Allium Cepa of the botanists, and, 

 like other plants which have been long subjected to 

 cultivation, has many varieties, distinguished by- 

 colour, size, and taste, and one of them by organi- 

 zation (the Canadense), which carries its fruit on its 

 head in the place of flowers. Of these varieties 

 the red is the largest, but most acrid ; the pale red 

 and the yellow are less in size than the red, and 

 somewhat milder ; but the white (of Spain and 

 Florence), though the smallest, are the mildest, the 

 soonest fit for use, and the best for keeping. They 

 are eaten like apples, and without any wry faces. 

 On analysis, they are found to possess less of those 



