HERBS AND AROMATIC PLANTS. 133 



in a pestle and mortar with a little salt. This is far superior to anything 

 which can be obtained at the shops; and it should therefore always 

 be grown in first-rate gardens. Chili vinegar is also made from them. 

 The cherry capsicum is a very beautiful plant, and very useful to add 

 to pickles. There is one fruit of this tribe of plants, the Solanum 

 antliropopliagonim (fig. 211), which is used by savages to promote 

 the digestibility of human flesh. 



I have often grown the Ginger plant (Zingiber officinale, fig. 2 [2), 

 but, as it is not a gaudy plant, somehow or other it is rarely kept 

 till the second year. The root when dried is used for medicine and 

 cookery, and when green is preserved with sugar. The stems are 

 annual, and die down in autumn. For preserving, the roots are 

 preferable when not too woody or too strongly filled with the ginger 

 principle : it has occurred to me, that it might be possible to grow it 

 here, for that purpose, during the summer season. I have never tried 

 it, but certainly shall on the first opportunity. In the fernery or 

 cucumber-house it grows with the greatest facility, and puts forth an 

 abundance of its creeping rhizomes, so that there would be no 

 difficulty for any person to grow his own ginger. 



FIG. iii. l ''lanum anthropo- 

 phagon:m. 



We are particular about our Tomatoes (Lycopersicum esailciititm, 

 fig. 213), which we grow in cold frames. They should be raised from 

 seed in February, and planted in the cold frames as soon as room can 

 be spared. A three-light frame will yield a large produce of fruit, 

 which is far superior in flavour to that imported from abroad, or to 



