SMOOTH-LEAVED DRUMHEAD CABBAGES 131 



its well-known characteristics will serve as points of comparison to 

 which we shall refer other varieties of foreign origin or more recent 

 introduction. It has a longish stem, quite as long, at least, as the 

 head, which is round, depressed, and almost flat when fully grown, 

 and of a wine-lees-red colour on the top. Outer leaves large, 

 rather stiff, the lower part closely pressed against the head, and the 

 upper part turned backwards, rather deep and glaucous green, and 

 rounded in outline, entire, not toothed nor undulated ; veins rather 

 large, and pale green. In the neighbourhood of Paris it is usually 

 sown from March to May, and the heads are cut in the autumn up 

 to the commencement of winter. 



A sub-variety of the Saint-Denis, which is a little earlier, was 

 for a long time grown under the name of Chou de Bonneuil, but it 

 has now either gone out of cultivation or become mixed up with 

 the ordinary variety. And yet, if we refer to the descriptions of 



Saint-Denis Drumhead Cabbage Late St. John's Day Cabbage 



( T V natural size). (^ natural size). 



the two kinds which were published over a century ago, it would 

 appear as if it was really the old Saint-Denis variety which has 

 gradually disappeared and been superseded by the Chou de Bonneuil. 

 The characteristics of the latter, as described in the eighteenth 

 century, were, in fact, the same as those which we recognise at the 

 present day in the Saint-Denis Cabbage, while the variety which 

 was then named Saint-Denis had a fuller and less flattened head 

 and a longer stem, and resembled the Late Flat Dutch Cabbage 

 up to a certain point. 



Late St. John's Day Cabbage (Chou Joanet tardtf). Stem 

 shorter than that of the preceding kind ; head rounder and not so 

 broad; outer leaves smaller, rounder, and a deeper green. The 

 plant does not take up so much ground as the Saint-Denis, and 

 comes in some days earlier, but it does not appear to bear frost 

 so well. The stem is so short that the head seems almost to rest 

 on the ground. 



