Rarity of the Potato. 1 2 r 



like some newly-landed product from rich 

 Cathay or Araby the Blest : 



" Take two quinces, and two or three burre rootes 

 and a Potaton, and pare youre Potaton and scrape your 

 roots, and put them into a quart of wine, and let them 

 boyle till they bee tender, and put in an ounce of dates, 

 and when they be boiled tender, drawe them through 

 a strainer, wine and all, and then put in the yolkes of 

 eight eggs, and the braynes of three or four cocke- 

 sparrowes, and straine them into the other, and a 

 little rosewater, and seeth them all with sugar, cinna- 

 mon, and ginger, and cloves, and mace ; and put in a 

 little sweet butter, and set it upon a chafing-dish of 

 coles between two platters, to let it boyle till it be 

 something bigge." 



Long after the age of Elizabeth the potato 

 remained a rarity in this country. As Dr. 

 Rimbault has pointed out, it was long ranked 

 with the date, the orange, and the plum of 

 Genoa ; and from a passage in Massinger's 

 New Way to pay Old Debts (1633), it may 

 be inferred that it was at that period still 

 regarded as a dainty. 



It seems to be thought that potatoes were 

 first propagated in Ireland in 1610 or there- 



