Use and Abuse of Salt in Gardens. 305 



perceiving that I had nearly filled my first sheet, before I had 

 well entered into my subject, and was convinced that I could 

 write a large volume on that very insignificant article, salt. 

 But I now feel rather daunted, to think I cannot put more 

 matter into fewer words, and shall endeavour to finish on that 

 article as soon as possible ; for as I intend giving you a treat 

 of twenty-four dishes, I think two of them filled with salt will 

 be quite sufficient. In order then to proceed methodically, 

 I will, as Lord Byron says, " begin at the beginning." First, 

 then, none of the ancients ever made use of salt as a manure. 

 Among the Egyptians, Chaldeans, and Greeks, according to 

 their mythology, salt was the very emblem of sterility. The 

 first time that salt is mentioned (as far as I remember), is an 

 account of an honest man's wife being turned into a pillar of 

 salt, which in allegory means barrenness. The Dead Sea 

 (which all the waters of Jordan cannot make sweeter than the 

 strongest brine), being nearly surrounded with rock-salt, has, 

 on its shores, the most barren spots on the globe. One huge 

 mass of rock protruding a little above the others has some 

 faint resemblance of a wrinkled old woman, and is shown to 

 travellers as the identical salt-lady alluded to. I have seen 

 several pieces of the said rock in England ; they are kept in 

 the museums of the vulgar curious, and serve the double pur- 

 pose of a very ancient relic, and an excellent hygrometer : the 

 Cheshire rock answers the latter purpose just as well. Again ; 

 when the ancients had any particular spite against a city, or 

 the land where the city had stood, their custom was to curse 

 it in the most solemn manner, and to sow it with salt ; not for 

 the purpose of manuring it, but that it might never afterwards 

 be any thing but a barren wilderness, and this shows that they 

 had not tried so many experiments with salt as I have done. 

 But that the ancients used salt as a stimulant, or seasoning, 

 is equally clear and certain. In the Greek sacrifices salt was 

 always one of the ingredients ; the very gods, it seems, had a 

 relish for salt the same as we have. And in Leviticus, ii. 1 3. 

 there is an order by Moses to the following effect : — " Every 

 oblation of thy meat-offering shalt thou season with salt ; nei- 

 ther shalt thou suffer the salt of the covenant of thy God to be 

 lacking from thy meat-offering." And again, " With all 

 thine offerings thou shalt offer salt." Now, what epicure 

 could give his cook more particular directions ? The explan- 

 ation given to this text, Mark, ix. 49., does not appear half so 

 intelligible, viz. " Every one must be salted with fire." I have 

 read several pamphlets on salt as a manure, &c, most of them 

 take their text from Luke, xiv. 34-, &c. Mr. G, W. Johnson 

 Vol. II. — No. 7. x 



