General Notices. 53 



seen exceeded. I might add that the fruiterers were willing to give the 

 market price for the fruit thus grown in the open air. I am, Sir, yours, &c. 

 — J. C. K. Levant Lodge, near Worcester, Dec. 1831. 



Purple Egg Plant. — This seems to be the only variety cultivated abroad 

 for culinary purposes. I have never once observed even a solitary speci- 

 men in any of the markets of Italy of the white variety, and yet I do not 

 perceive why the latter should not be as good as the former. It is dressed 

 precisely similar to " vegetable marrow." A celebrated traveller informed 

 me that he was once present at an Oriental entertainment, where a growing 

 egg plant was introduced : and the fruit, pendent from the tree, had under- 

 gone various culinary processes, by the dexterous ingenuity of the Chinese : 

 some were boiled, others roasted, &c. — J. Murray. August, 1830. 



Culture of the Tomatoes (Lycopersica.) — I do not think the tomato, or love- 

 apple, is so much cultivated in this country as it deserves ; in some places 

 possibly it may never ripen thoroughly, but even in an unripe state it makes 

 an excellent sauce, like apples or gooseberries, for roast meat, such as pork 

 or goose, its acidity being more pleasing than that of apples ; and, when fully 

 ripe, tomatoes make an excellent store sauce, for which I send you a receipt 

 (Vol. VII. p. 698.), and 1 think they might be found to keep as well as 

 some other of our more delicate fruits. They grow easily, after being 

 raised in a hot-bed ; and, from the peculiar odour of their leaves, do not 

 so much attract that great enemy of our transplanted seedlings, the slug. 

 It is a mistaken notion, too, that they will only thrive in this country 

 against a wall : they are better away from fruit walls, the trees of which 

 they materially injure, and will thrive as well, when transplanted on a com- 

 mon bed, straggling in their devious course like vegetable marrows or any 

 other of the gourd tribe. Indeed, they may extend to any length, from 

 their propensity to strike root at every joint ; and I have, even in the 

 confined limits which I could afford them in my own scanty garden, 

 gathered as many as a peck in a morning. 



Having mentioned the slug as the great enemy of our gardens, I will 

 just hint at the mode I take to destroy them, and which I have found very 

 effectual ; of course, such a plan is hardly available any where but in a 

 small garden, except by broad-cast, which is not so certain in its results. 

 Every morning and evening, or after rain, I send a boy round the different 

 borders and beds with a small bowl of salt, a few grains of which he drops 

 on every slug he finds ; and it is really astonishing in how short a time 

 a sensible diminution of the evil is effected. The above fasciculus of 

 hints is much at your service. — B. B. Sept. 6. 1831. 



The Scarlet-runner Kidneybean was a perennial plant in my father's 

 garden at Kitwell House, Worcestershire, in 1810, 1811, and 1812. What 

 became of it afterwards I do not know, as we then left the place, and let 

 it for some years. — J. W. L. Baysiuater, August 25. 1831. 



The Scarlet Runner a Perennial. — Sir, Since you published the instances 

 in Vol. VII. p. 485., I have discovered another. Mr. Stephen Watts, Ken- 

 sington Gravel Pits, about eight years ago witnessed it, as well as many of his 

 neighbours. His garden is bounded on the west by the blank back of a 

 house, which fronts the other way ; consequently, the wall, which is 20 ft. 

 high, presents its eastern face to his garden. Along this face, at a few inches 

 from its base, he planted a row of scarlet runners ; the haulm, herbage, &c. 

 resulting from which were not displaced till the following spring. The man 

 Mr. Watts employed in digging the ground left, by accident or sloven- 

 liness, three root- stocks of the scarlet runner less disturbed than the rest, 

 for three grew again in the second year. Of these three, two were fair 

 plants, not much exceeding in size a strong plant in its first year's growth ; 

 but the third plant was a prodigy : its branches spread over a space of 6 ft. 

 at a few feet from the ground, and then gradually tapered off as they 

 ascended, and the central one or more of them actually reached the 



E 3 



