316 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



by the famous nurserymen, London and Wise, they were not 

 deemed worthy of even a passing notice, and Bradly, another 

 famous horticulturist, speaks of them as inferior to radishes. 

 The ignorance and prejudice of our English fathers must have 

 been great or they must have had a very inferior potato under 

 cultivation. 



Merit is, however, always sure of finding its way, sooner or 

 later. Li the case of potatoes it was certainly later, for it was 

 not till the middle of the eighteenth century, two hundred years 

 after their introduction, that they were generally known and 

 cultivated throughout England. The Irish were keener witted, 

 and enjoyed the comfort and profit of potatoes long before their 

 neighbors across the channel appreciated them. Scotland began 

 to raise potatoes on a small scale in gardens about 1740, and 

 about twenty years after, the demand for them was so great that 

 the Scotch farmers began to raise them in their fields. In 1796 

 about seventeen hundred acres of potatoes were planted in Essex 

 County alone for the supply of the London market. Tlie Eng- 

 lish were, however, slow to learn the best modes of cultivation, 

 and for a long time a few of the tubers were removed from the 

 ground in autumn and the balance left for seed, as Evelyn had 

 recommended, covered with litter to save them from the winter's 

 frost. In New England the potato has always been appreciated, 

 and nowhere is it raised in so great perfection, and nowhere 

 is it cooked in a greater variety of modes, and with greater 

 skill, — so generally is it relished that it appears on the table 

 every day in the year, — and no vegetable keeps so well from one 

 season to another. Whenever meat is cooked potatoes are sure 

 to bo cooked with it, and a New Englander would find it a sorry 

 thing to go back to the good old times of his Saxon ancestors, 

 when they sat down to the table laden only with meats and 

 black bread. We may talk about these good old times, but if 

 we were put back to them we should find it all talk and no 

 potato. 



In the early days, or rather centuries, of potato cultivation, 

 it was treated as a species having no varieties. For the intro- 

 duction of varieties we are indebted to the market gardeners 

 near Manchester, England. Encouraged by the demand, these 

 gardeners vied with each other in securing the earliest and best 

 varieties. They marked the plants that flowered early, saved 



