95 



" Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry," pub- 

 lished in 1573, he says, " Sperage let grow two 

 years, and then remove ;" and Lyte, in his transla- 

 tion of ''Dodonseus' Herball," in 1578, figures As- 

 paragus, the Garden Sperage ; and Corruda, the Wild 

 Sperage. 



Gerard's "Herball" appeared in 1597, and here 

 five kinds are delineated : — Asparagus sativus, Gar- 

 den Sperage ; A. palustris, March Sperage ; A, 

 petrceus, Mountain Sperage ; A. sylvestris, Wild 

 Sperage ; and A. sylvestris spinosus, Thorny Sperage. 

 The first and second, he observes, " differ not in kind, 

 but only in manuring, by which all, or most things 

 are made more beautiful and larger." In Gerard's 

 time, however, manuring, he says, had increased the 

 size of its shoots to no greater circumference than 

 that of '^ a swan's quill." 



Didymus Mountain, or rather Henry Dethicke, in 

 his "Gardener's Labyrinth," published in 1577, has 

 a chapter on " What singular skill and secrets are to 

 be known in the sowing, removing, and setting again, 

 of the worthy herb named Sperage." These secrets, 

 however, as he unreservedly states, are mere extracts 

 from the Latin and Greek writers, Cato, Columella, 

 Phny, Palladius, Didymus, &c. 



Lawson, in his "New Orchard and Garden," pub- 

 lished in 1626, does not even mention Sperage among 

 his kitchen garden herbs. But in France great atten- 



