72 RUTA BAGA CULTURE. Part I. 



stocked, not with mouths, but with food, owini^ to 

 a little care in the cultivation of this invaliible 

 Root, he would, I am sure, have reason to be con- 

 vinced, that, if any former in the United States is 

 in want of food at this pinching season of the year, 

 the fault is neither in the soil nor in the climate. 



28. It is, therefore, of my mode of cultivating 

 this Root in this island that I mean, at present to 

 treat ; to which matter I shall add, in another Part 

 of my work, an account of my experiments as to 

 the Mangle WuRTZLE, or Scarcity Root ; though, 

 as will be seen, I deem that root, except in parti- 

 cular cases, of very inferior importance. The 

 Parsnip, the Carrot, the Cabbage, are all excellent 

 in their kind and in their uses ; but, as to these, I 

 have not yet made, upon a scale sufficiently large 

 here, such experiments as would warrant me in 

 speaking with any great degree of confidence. Of 

 these and other matters I propose to treat in a fu- 

 ture Part, which I shall, probably, publish towards 

 the latter end of this present year. 



29. The Ruta Baga is a sort of Turnip well 

 known in the State of New York, where, under the 

 name of Russia Turnip, it is used for the table from 

 February to July. But, as it may be more of a 

 stranger in other parts of the countr}^, it seems ne- 

 cessary to give it enough of description to enable 

 every reader to distinguish it from ever}^ other sort 

 of Turnip. 



30. The leaf of every other sort of Turnip is of 

 a yellowish green, while the leaf of the Ruta Baga 

 is of a bluish s;reen, like tlie green of peas when of 

 nearl}' their fnll size, or like the green of a young 

 and thrifty early Yorkshire Cabbage, Hence ii is, 

 I suppose, that some persons have called it the 

 Cabbage-Turnip, But, the characteristics the most 

 decidedly distinctive are these : that the outside 

 of the bv.lb of the Ruta Baga is of a greenish hue 

 mixed, towards the top, with a colour bordering on a 



