BEETS AND MANGOLDS. 239 



Philadelphia beet, is a very early variety, very symmetrical, and 

 excellent quality. It has a little deeper color than the Early 

 Bassano. These varieties are characterized by great smoothness. 

 Then we have the extra flat kind, which is very early. 



Mr. J. F. C. Hyde. How about the Egyptian beet ? 



Mr. Gregory. I can't say. It does not seem to have the 

 quality of our beets. 



Mr. Hyde. It is the finest quality I raise. 



Mv. Gregory. There are a great many English beets, — the 

 Casteliiaudary, Carter's Early, and so on. The great trouble 

 with the English beets is, they are not suited to us. We want 

 the turnip beet. I imported from England, one year, all the 

 varieties I could find, and 'there was not a single good turnip 

 beet in the lot. The Egyptian beet is very dark colored, and that 

 is in its favor. Those that I have seen were not so large as ours. 



The term " sugar beet " is sometimes used since beet sugar 

 has become an article of production in Europe ; it is an unfor- 

 tunate term. The sugar beet is a mangold ; it is not a table 

 beet. The turnip beet is a svgary beet, but not a sugar 

 beet. The sugar beet is an underground mangold, makes a 

 very large top and rather a small bottom in proportion to the 

 top. As a mangold, it is the most unprofitable kind to grow, 

 but it is the kind we are very apt to get when we undertake to 

 import seed from Europe. There is a white mangold which 

 grows above ground. The rule is that no part of the sugar 

 beet should be out of the ground. If it is, some chemical 

 change takes place which is objectionable. It gives a vegetable 

 taint or color to the sugar, which it causes some trouble to 

 remove. Therefore, it is desirable that the sugar beet should 

 grow under ground. 



Of mangolds, we have the long red, and improvements on 

 that. Among them is the Norbiton Giant. One of my neigh- 

 bors grew a Norbiton Giant that weighed thirty odd pounds. 

 The Norbiton Giant is characterized by growing freely out of 

 the ground, without making so hollow a neck as that of the 

 long red. You know the neck of the large mangolds is all lost. 

 It is hollow, woody and good for nothing. That is one of the 

 results where mangolds are planted rather early. Now, we can 

 plant the Norbiton Giant earlier than the common red, without 

 having that long neck to trouble us. 



