COMMON GARDEN PLANTS 101 



varieties, may be grouped together here as illus- 

 trating, jointly and severally, the methods of 

 the plant developer when applied to garden veg- 

 etables, and as offering interesting possibilities 

 of development for the amateur gardener. 



The Melon Family 



At the outset we may consider the melons, 

 partly because the product that they offer may 

 be said to occupy an intermediate place between 

 the fruits proper, as grown in the orchard, and 

 what are commonly spoken of as garden vege- 

 tables. The melons are, indeed, fruits of a dis- 

 tinctive order. They seem of unique type to us 

 merely because our point of observation is that 

 of residents of a temperate zone. In tropical 

 regions, fruits like the melons abound, the 

 family to which the melon belongs being a very 

 extensive one, represented in the aggregate by 

 several hundred species. 



The most generally cultivated member of the 

 melon family in the ordinary kitchen garden is 

 doubtless the form known as the cucumber. The 

 ordinary cucumber has long been under cultiva- 

 tion and has been greatly improved, especially 

 in Europe. It has been made to take on various 

 forms of fruit, and the best varieties have been 

 practically relieved from the spines with which 



