NO. 11. 



THE FARMERS' CABINKT. 



171 



disproportionate space that is allotted to this 

 staple commodily that the mischief it is 

 said to have produced, is attributable. 



ITImijg^el Wurtzel. 



Mr. Wm. K. Townsend, in a letter to the 

 editor of the New York Farmer, has the 

 foilowiiiff remarks on this valuable root. 



" I am every season more and more con- 

 vinced of the value of this (the Mangel 

 Wurtzel,) crop to farmers like myself, that 

 winter a tolerably lar^e stock. Tliis is my 

 fourth season of culiivatintr them, and 1 

 mean in future to increase the quantity three 

 fold. I took off my crop last fall in season 

 to seed down the field with rye and wrass. — 

 The crop of rye was excellent, and the ojrass 

 is now equal to that in the same field, sowed 

 after a crop of early potatoes. I do not be- 

 lieve they exhaust land more than any other 

 root crop ; if the land is well prepared, and 

 the seed sown at the proper time, two good 

 hoeings are sufficient. I have this season 

 gathered the under leaves for my hogs, and 

 they will eat them as fast as any thing that 

 I can give them. I do not think the crop is 

 injured by taking them off. As my early 

 beets did not come to perfection, we used 

 the mangel wurtzel, taking out the smallest, 

 when two grew together, in their stead ; and 

 if well cooked and prepared for the table, 

 we think them as good as beets. I usually 

 raise them to feed out after my turnips are 

 gone in the spring; my milch cows do well 

 on them, as well as other cattle, and I want 

 no better feed for my breeding cows and 

 store pigs along early in the spring, before 

 they get a good bite of grass." 



The Papaw— Carica Papaya. 



Though the papaw-tree is now foun^l in 

 the East as well as in the West, it is gen- 

 erally understood to be a native of America, 

 and have been carried to the East about the 

 time of the first intercourse between the two 

 continents. The papaw rises with a hollow 

 stem to the height of from eighteen to twen- 

 ty feet, after which it has a head composed, 

 not of branches, but of leaves and very long 

 foot-stalks. The male and female flowers 

 are on different trees : the female flowers 

 are bell-shaped, large, generally yellow, 

 and followed by a fleshy fruit, about the size 

 of a small melon. The tree and even the 

 fruit are full of an acrid milky juice; but 

 the fruit is eaten with sugar and pepper, like 

 melon ; and when the half-grown fruit is 

 properly pickled, it is but little inferior to 

 the pickled mango of the East Indies. There 

 are many forms in the fruit, and some varie- 

 ties in the color of the flower of the papaw ; 



and there is also a dwarf species; though as 

 this has been observed chiefly in airy situa- 

 tions, it may be the common sort stunted for 

 want of moisture. 



■ Fig. A9.— The Papaw. 

 The American papaw, in our view, is the 

 prince of wild fruit-bearing shrubs. The 

 leaves are long, of a rich appearance, and 

 green, considerably resembling the smaller 

 leaves of tobacco. The stem is straight, 

 white, and of unrivalled beauty. In fact, we 

 have seen no cultivated shrub, so ornamen- 

 tal and graceful, as the papaw. The fruit 

 closely resembles a cucumber, having, how- 

 ever a very smooth and regular appearance. 

 When ripe it is of a rich yellow. There are 

 generally from two to five in a cluster. A 

 papaw shrub, hanging full of fruits, of a size 

 and weight so disproportioned to the stem, 

 and from under long and rich looking leaves 

 of the same yellow with the ripened fruit 

 and of an African luxuriance of growth, is 

 to us one of the richest spectacles, that we 

 have ever contemplated in the array of the 

 woods. — The fruit contains from two to six 

 seeds, like those of the tamarind except that 

 they are double the size. The pulp of the 

 fruit resembles that of an egg custard, in con- 

 sistance and appearance. It has the same 

 creamy feeling in the mouth, and unites the 

 taste of eggs, cream, sugar and spice. It 

 is a natural custard, too luscious for the rel- 

 ish of most people. The fruit isnutricious, 

 and a great resource to savages. So many 

 whimsical and unexpected tastes are com- 

 pounded in it, that, it is said, a person of the 

 most hypocondriac temperament, relaxes to 



a smile when he 

 time. 



tastes papaw, for the first 



