534 PRACTICE OF AGRICULTURE. Part III. 



difficult to extirpate. Whenever they throw the earth out of their ditches in the Isle of 

 Ely, the bank comes up thick with mustard ; and the seed, falling into the water and 

 sinking to the bottom, will remain embalmed in the mud for ages without vegetation. 



6104. No such luxury as mustard, in its present form, was known at our tables previously to 1720. At 

 that time the seed was only coarsely pounded in a mortar, as coarsely separated from the integuments, 

 and in that rough state prepared for use. In the year I have mentioned, it occurred to an old woman of 

 the name of Clements, resident at Durham, to grind the seed in a mill, and to pass the meal through the 

 several processes which are resorted to in making flour from wheat. The secret she kept for many years 

 to herself, and, in the period of her exclusive possession of it, supplied the principal parts of the kingdom, 

 and in particular the metropolis, with this article ; and George I. stamped it with fashion by his approval. 

 Mrs. Clements as regularly twice a year travelled to London, and to the principal towns throughout 

 England, for orders, as any tradesman's rider of the present day; and the old lady contrived to pick up 

 not only a decent pittance, but what was then thought a tolerable competence. From this woman's resid- 

 ing at Durham, it acquired the name of Durham mustard. {Meek. Mag. vol. iv. p. 87.) 



6105. Anr/ rick loamy soil will raise a crop of mustard, and no other preparation is 

 required than that of a good deep ploughing and harrowing sufficient to raise a mould 

 on the surface. The seeds may be sown broad-cast at the rate of one lippie per acre ; 

 harrowed in and guarded from birds till it comes up, and hoed and weeded before it begins 

 to shoot. In Kent, according to the survey of Boys, white mustard is cultivated for the 

 use of the seedsmen in London. In the tillage for it, the ploughed land is, he says, 

 harrowed over, and then furrows are stricken about eleven or twelve inches apart, sowing 

 the seed in the proportion of two or three gallons per acre in March. The crop is after- 

 wards hoed and kept free from weeds. 



6106. Mustard is reaped in the beginning of September, being tied in sheaves, and left 

 three or four days on the stubble. It is then stacked in the field. It is remarked that 

 rain damages it. A good crop is three or four quarters an acre ; the price from 75. to 

 205. a bushel. Three or four crops are sometimes taken running, but this must in most 

 cases be bad husbandry. 



6107. The use of the white mustard is or should be chiefly for medical and horticul- 

 tural purposes, though it is often ground into flour, and mixed with the black, which is 

 much stronger, and far more difficult to free from its black husks. The black or com- 

 mon mustard is exclusively used for grinding into flour of mustard, and the black husk 

 is separated by very delicate machinery. 



6108. The French either do not attempt to separate the husk, or do not succeed in it, as their mustard 

 when brought to table is always black. It is, however, more pungent than ours, because that quality 

 resides chiefly in the husk. The constituents of mustard seed appear to be chiefly starch, mucus, a bland 

 fixed oil, an acrid volatile oil, and an ammoniacal salt. The fresh powder. Dr. CuUen observes, shows 

 little pungency ; but when it has been moistened with vinegar and kept for a day, the essential oil is 

 evolved, and it is then much more acrid. 



6109. The leaves of the mustard family, like those of all the radish and J5riissica tribe, are eaten green 

 by cattle and sheep, and may be used as pot-herbs. The haulm is commonly burned ; but is better era- 

 ployed as litter for the straw- yard, or for covering underdrains, if any happen to be forming at the time. 



6110. As substitutes for either the black or common mustard, most of the Crucifera^ 

 enumerated when treating of oil plants (6098.) may be used, especially the iSinapis 

 arvensis, or charlock, S. orientalis, chinensis, and Jrassicata, the latter commonly cultivated 

 in China. The TJaphanus Raphanistrum, common in corn fields, and known as the wild 

 mustard, is so complete a substitute, that it is often separated from the refuse corn and 

 sold as Durham mustard seed. 



SuBSECT. 2. Buck-wheat. Voli)gonum Fagopyrum L. ; Octdndria Trigynia L., and 

 Yolygbnecs 3. Ble noir or Ble Sarrazin, Fr. (corrupted from Had-razin, i. e. red corn, 

 Celtic); Buchweitzen, Ger. ; Miglio, Ital. ; and Trigo negro, Span. {fig. 806.) 



6111. The buck-wheat, or more properly beech-wheat (from the 

 resemblance of the seeds to beech mast, as its Latin and German 

 names import), is an annual fibrous-rooted plant, with upright 

 flexuous leafy stems, generally tinged with red, and rising from a 

 foot to three feet in height. The flowers are either white or tinged 

 with red, and make a handsome appearance in July, and the seeds 

 ripen in August and September. Its native country is unknown ; 

 though it is attributed to Asia. It is cultivated in China and other 

 countries of the East as a bread corn, and has been grown from time 

 immemorial in Britain, and most parts of Europe, as food for poultry 

 and horses, and also to be ground into meal for domestic purposes. 

 The universality of its culture is evidently owing to the little labour 

 it requires : it will grow on the poorest soil, and produce a crop in 

 the course of three or four months. It was cultivated as early as 

 Gerard's time (1597), to be ploughed in as manure ; but at present, 

 from its inferior value as a grain, and its yielding very little haulm 

 for fodder or manure, it is seldom grown but by gentlemen in their 

 plantations to encourage game. Arthur Young, however, " recom- 

 mends farmers in general to try this crop. Nineteen parishes out 

 of twenty, through the kingdom, know it only by name. It has 



