196 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



CABBAGE. 



Under the head of Brassicaceous plants, Burr, in his Field 

 and Garden Vegetables of America, enumerates Kale, Broccoli, 

 Brussels Sprouts, Cabbage, Cauliflower, Colewort, Portugal 

 Cabbage, Chinese Cabbage, Savoy, and Sea-Kale. 



These are divided into numerous varieties, each possessing 

 the same general characteristics, and yet distinguished for their 

 habit of growth, their appearance, their flavor, or some other 

 quality peculiar to themselves. Of these we have selected the 

 cabbage as not only the most important of the brassica tribe, 

 but as next to the potato, perhaps, the most largely used of 

 any vegetable esculent in Massachusetts, or even in New Eng- 

 land. Especially has this been the case since the introduction 

 in so large proportion of the foreign element to our population. 

 Among the Irish, the Germans, and the French, at least the 

 Canadian French, in its season, and in one form or another, it 

 forms a staple article of consumption. And there is good 

 reason for this, since the cabbage is one of the most nutritious 

 vegetables grown, containing, according to Johnston, when 

 deprived of its water, about thirty-five per cent, of tissue-form- 

 ing compounds, such as albumen, &c., and forty-six per cent, of 

 starch and sugar, while the potato contains only nine per cent. 

 of the former, though it is richer in starch than the cabbage. 



It is a curious fact, affording a good illustration of that instinct 

 by which man, in his natural and simple state, lays hold of 

 those productions the nearest allied to his wants which his 

 circumstances will allow, in that, being unable to procure in 

 their native country a free supply of meats, these hard-working 

 people should have substituted for it two vegetables the best 

 calculated to sujjply the waste of muscle tissue, occasioned by 

 their daily toil. 



We have no means of ascertaining its comparative value 

 among the productions of the State, or the part that it plays in 

 the support of its population ; but if there were any statistics, 

 as there should be, by which these points could be proved, 

 probably its importance would be a matter for surprise to the 

 superficial observer. Its great use for culinary purposes, how- 

 ever, is not confined to New England, or to this country even. 

 Dr. Unger, whom I have already quoted, says : " No kitchen- 

 garden in Europe is without it, and it is distributed over the 



