THE POTATO. 



275 



ere, as they are called, are allowed a house in the 

 village, and land for their subsistence, in the 

 surrounding fields. 



In such a state of the peasantry the cultiva- 

 tion of the potato would offer peculiar advan- 

 tages, as no other substantial article of food 

 could be raised by the inexperienced rustic in 

 equal quantities, with so little risk and trouble, 

 and without any but his own and his family's 

 being required for its culture and after-prepara- 

 tion. Accordingly, when once this plant was 

 introduced into cottage cultivation in Scotland. 

 its importance was quickly recognized. 



It is understood, however, that this valuable 

 root was not, until the year 1728, made the ob- 

 ject of useful culture among the Scotch, and 

 they were then indebted to a cottager for first 

 attempting its culture. This man's name was 

 Thomas Prentice; he was a day-labourer living 

 near Kilsyth, in Stirlingshire, and drawing his 

 subsistence partly from the produce of his little 

 plot of ground. This crop proved extremely 

 valuable, and wag almost instantly in demand 

 for propagating other crops, first among the cot- 

 tagers, and then among the farmers. Prentice 

 continued to cultivate this root very carefully, 

 and to supply his neighbours with the produce 

 of his crop. He was, moreover, frugal and in- 

 dustrious, so that in a few years he found him- 

 self in possession of two hundred pounds, no 

 small fortune at that time and in that place. 

 When he had "made his fortune," he sank his 

 capital in an annuity, at a good interest, upon 

 which he lived independently to an old age. 

 The last years of his life were spent in Edin- 

 burgh, where he died in the year 1792, at the 

 advanced age of eighty-six, having thus been, 

 for sixty-four years, a witness to the happy ef- 

 fects of the blessing which he had been instru- 

 mental in conferring on his country. 



But notwithstanding the success that attended 

 the culture of the potato among the cottagers, 

 its progress among the higher classes in Scotland 

 was retarded by the opinions of the writers for- 

 merly alluded to; while, what is not a little 

 singular, amistaken zeal in religious matters made 

 some of the Scotch folks hostile to the innovation. 

 "Potatoes," said they, "are not mentioned in the 

 bible," and thus the same anathema was pro- 

 nounced against them as against the " spinning- 

 wheel," and the "corn farmers." 



The name of this plant was indeed inserted in 

 the Hortus Medicus Edinburgensis, published 

 by Sutherland in 1683. It is therefore probable 

 that the potato had been introduced as a curi- 

 osity into some of the gardens about Edinburgh 

 some time before it was brought into full culture 

 by Prentice. But if its management was the 

 same as that recommended by so great an author- 

 ity as Evelyn, the produce was, most probably, 

 of little value. 



The year 1742, which was long remembered 

 in Scotland as the "dear year," gave an impulse 

 to the cultivation of the potato. Old people 

 who were stiU living at the beginning of the 

 present century, represented the state of things 

 in the summer of 1743 as being dreadful. Many 

 of the destitute wandered in the fields seeking to 

 prolong the misery of existence by devouring the 

 leaves of pease and beans, of sorrel and other 

 wild plants, while not a few perished from ab- 

 solute want, and still more were carried off by 

 those diseases which always follow and aggra- 

 vate the devastations of famine. This state of 

 distress naturally called the general attention to 

 the cultivation of the potato, and indeed to the 

 whole agriculture of the country. So that, dur- 

 ing the latter half of the eighteenth century, 

 the practice and science of husbandry made much 

 more rapid progress in Scotland than in England. 

 Previously to this general scarcity in 1743, some 

 potatoes which were growing in the county of 

 Roxburgh, were so uncommon as to have been 

 considered objects of curiosity. But the state 

 of things soon altered; and immediately after 

 the "dear year," the farmers of Lothian began to 

 make this a branch of field husbandry. 



In England, with the exception of Lancashire, 

 the progress of the cultivation of the potato 

 continued at an extremely slovir pace. It was 

 known in Yorkshire only as' garden produce 

 down to 1760; and in Somersetshire it was rare 

 indeed to meet with a whole acre under this cul- 

 ture so late as 1770. 



So little attention had been bestowed on this 

 subject even by the most intelligent land-owners, 

 that Miller, in the quarto edition of his Gardener's 

 Dictionary, published in 1771, names only two 

 varieties, and founds the distinction of these not 

 upon quality, or time of coming to maturity, 

 but on the trifling accident of a red and of a 

 white colour, which is found to be productive of 

 no other difference. At present, however, the 

 varieties are so numerous, without any reference 

 to colour, that it would be equally vain to at- 

 tempt their description within any limited com- 

 pass, as it is unnecessary to point out their uses, 

 or enumerate their properties. 



Not many years after the appearance of Miller's 

 valuable work, the potato began to form an im- 

 portant article of English husbandry; and in 

 the year 1796 it was found that in the county 

 of Essex alone seventeen hundred acres were 

 planted with this root for the supply of the 

 London market. 



The culture of the potato is now so exten- 

 sive in this country, that an abundant supply 

 can be obtained in all places throughout the 

 year, and such have been the improvements in 

 the culture, and the varieties to which these im- 

 provements have led, that a succession is fur- 

 nished fresh out of the earth for nearly six 



