Gtiltivation of Trivffles. 409 



with the edible ones. Every admirer of truffles (and who is not 

 such, when he has once tasted perfectly ripe ones ?) will rejoice 

 to learn that they may be, and have been, raised upon situations 

 adapted to them, as well as mushrooms ; and that the planting 

 of them is neither expensive nor troublesome. Every one who 

 has a proper situation for them on his estate, will most willingly 

 make plantations of them according to the directions here given. 

 At a small expense, he will augment at once the pleasures of 

 his table, and also his income ; for in a few years the crops will 

 have so increased, as to enable the planter to offer them for sale. 

 He will then not only receive back his first expenses, but also 

 a considerable surplus. There is no reason to apprehend that 

 truffles will, by means of numerous plantations of them, sink in 

 value (as almost all productions of landed property have done), 

 so as to be hardly worth any thing; since most of those who 

 buy truffles dwell in large towns, and are so engaged as to have 

 no time to raise them. On the contrary, by the extension of 

 the cultivation of truffles, the money now paid for them to fo- 

 reigners would be spared to our country, at which every sincere 

 lover of it would rejoice; and the consumption of the article 

 would probably be very greatly increased. We may confidently 

 expect an active participation in extending the cultivation of 

 truffles, from the exertions of our horticultural societies. By 

 this extension, not only will the profit of land be increased, but 

 also the pleasures of society, as these are more promoted by 

 delicacies for the table than by the I'arest flowers. 



Amongst the various species of fungi which man has applied 

 to his nutriment, the truffle is of the greatest value. Morels 

 are much inferior to it. Even the highly esteemed cultivated 

 mushroom is not to be compared with it, still less are other edible 

 fungi. With connoisseurs it is in higher estimation than the 

 pine-apple amongst fruits, and the oyster amongst bivalves. The 

 high estimation in which truffles are held, and their dearness, 

 are not however occasioned by their peculiarly fine aromatic 

 flavour alone, but by the difficulties which are connected with 

 seeking them in woody situations. Dogs must be broken in, or 

 swine must be accustomed to discover and turn them up; and 

 only a few people understand the art of accustoming these animals 

 to resist their natural voracity, and to leave to man the food they 

 have discovered. 



On this account, the truffle, in Germany, appears only upon the 

 tables of the wealthy, and of those who have large landed pos- 

 sessions ; in which they seldom cause truffles to be sought for, 

 but buy them at a high price from foreigners. Truffles grow in 

 several woods; but people avoid the trouble of either digging 

 them up, or of training dogs and swine, to enable them with 

 facility to take them out of the earth. German truffles are left 



