ON THE ENNOBLING OF ROOTS, 



WITH PARTICULAR REFERENCE TO THE PARSNIP. 



By JAMES BUG KM AN, F.L.S., F.G.S., 



EW people who have studied the matter attentively 

 but have arrived at the conclusion that those plants 

 which we cultivate for their roots were not naturally 

 endowed with the root portion of their structure, either of the 

 size or form which would [now be considered as essential for 

 perfect crop plants ; thus the parsnip, carrot, turnip, beet, &c., 

 as we find them in nature, have nowhere the large, fleshy, 

 smooth appearance which belongs to their cultivated forms, and 

 hence all the varieties of these that we meet with in cultivation 

 must be considered as Derivatives from original wild forms 

 obtained by cultivative processes, that is collecting their seed, 

 planting it in a prepared bed, stimulating the growth of the 

 plants with manures, thinning, regulating, weeding, and such 

 other acts as constitute farming or gardening, as the case 

 may be. 



Hence, then, it is concluded that such plants as are grown for 

 their roots have a peculiar aptitude for laying on tissue and thus 

 increasing the bulk of their " descending axis," that is, that 

 portion of their structure which grows downwards root. 

 Besides this, they are remarkable for their capability of produc- 

 ing varieties, a fact which, united witn a constancy in the 

 maintenance of an induced form, renders it exceedingly easy to 

 bring out new sorts which will maintain their characteristics 

 under great diversities of climate, soil, and treatment. 



