THE CABBAGE TRIBE. 



295 



procured, and as many chances of escaping tho 



fly. 



Turnips, if carefully cultivated, attain to a 

 very great size in this country, though appearing 

 insignificant when compared with the gigantic 

 root of the Roman naturalist. Tull spealjs of 

 some weighing as much as nineteen pounds, and 

 of often meeting with others of sixteen pounds. 

 In Surrey, a Swedish turnip, the seed of which 

 had been sown in July, was dug up in October, 

 1828, which weighed twenty-one pounds, and 

 was one yard in circumference. But these are 

 far surpassed by one which was puUed up in 

 1758 atTudenham, in Norfolk, and which weighed 

 twenty-nine pounds. In No. 360 of the Philo- 

 sophical Transactions, we find a curious calcula- 

 tion made by Dr Desaguliers, on the rapid in- 

 crease of a turnip root. One ounce of turnip 

 seed was found by him to contain between four- . 

 teen and fifteen thousand single seeds; therefore, 

 one seed would weigh one-fourteen or one fifteen- 

 thousandth part of an ounce; and assuming its 

 growth to be always uniform, a turnip seed may 

 increase fifteen, times its own weight in a minute! 

 By an actual experiment made on moss or peat 

 ground, turnips have been found to increase by 

 growth 16,990 times the weight of their seeds 

 each day they stood upon it. It is not, how- 

 ever, only the size and weight of the root which 

 renders this crop so productive; the number con- 

 tained in a given space, with reference to theu' 

 size, is very great. Some writers speak rather 

 marvellously on this subject, but it is generally 

 thought a good crop to obtain a turnip from each 

 sq^uare foot of ground. Mill considers an average 

 crop to be 1 1,664 roots per acre, which at six 

 pounds each, will be 69,984 pounds. 



The uses of the turnip as a culinary vegetable, 

 are too familiarly known to require that they 

 should be here enumerated. Though in very 

 extensive favour among the moderns, the dif- 

 ferent modes of preparing it appear poor and in- 

 sipid compared with those efforts of gastronomic 

 skiU by which the ancients made it assume so 

 many inviting forms. It is related that "the 

 king of Bithynia, in some expedition against the 

 Scythians in the winter, and at a great distance 

 from the sea, had a violent longing for a small 

 fish called aphy — a pilchard, a herring, or an an- 

 chovy. His cook cut a turnip to the perfect 

 imitation of its shape; then, fried in oil, salted, 

 and well powdered with the grains of a dozen 

 black poppies, his majesty's taste was so exqui- 

 sitely deceived, that he praised the root to his 

 guest as an excellent fish. This transmutation 

 of vegetables into meat or fish, is a province of 

 the culinary art which we appear to have lost; 

 yet these are cili innocentes, (harmless food) 

 compared with the things themselves." 



Our more immediate ancestors appear to have 

 applied the turnip to more extensive uses as an 



esculent than is done in tlie present day. It is 

 recorded, that in the years 1629 and 1630, when 

 there was a dearth in England, very good, white, 

 lasting, and wholesome bread was made of boiled 

 turnips, deprived of their moisture by pressure, 

 and then kneaded with an equal quantity of 

 wheaten flour, the whole forming what was 

 called turnip-bread. The scarcity of com in 

 1693, obliged the poor people of Essex again to 

 have recourse to this species of food. This bread 

 could not, it is said, bedistinguished by the eye 

 from a wheaten loaf; neither did the smeU much 

 betray it, especially when cold. 



The earliest spring-produced leaves of tho 

 turnip are sometimes boiled or stewed, and ap- 

 pear on the table under the name of turnip-tops. 

 The Romans likewise applied these tender leaves 

 to the same purpose. 



Turnips, in all their varieties, do not contain 

 so much nourishment as either carrots or pars- 

 nips. Sir Humphrey Davy's analysis gives only 

 forty-two parts of nutritive matter in one 

 thousand parts of the common turnip, and sixty- 

 four parts in one thousand parts of the Swedish 

 root; but as the turnips cultivated in the environs 

 of London are not considered of so good a quality 

 as those farther north, it is probable that this 

 estimate may be somewhat below the average 

 proportion. 



The Cabbage Tribe, (Brassica oleracea), is 

 perhaps of all culinary vegetables, the most an- 

 cient as well as the most extensively cultivated. 

 The original plant being extremely liable to run 

 into aU sorts of varieties, has in the course of time 

 become the parent of a numerous race of culinary 

 vegetables, so various in their habit and appear- 

 ance, that to many it may appear not a little 

 extravagant to refer them to the same origin. Be- 

 sides the difi^erent sorts of white and red cab- 

 bage and savoys which form their leaves into a 

 head, there are various sorts of borecoles which 

 grow with their leaves loose, in the natural way, 

 and there are several kinds of cauliflower and 

 brocoli whichform a head of their stalksor flower 

 buds. All these, from the true cabbage, growing 

 to the height of twelve feet, to the colzer and 

 some other varieties, which before they come 

 into bloom seldom exceed a foot in height, 

 including the turnip rooted cabbage, and the 

 Brussels sprouts, claim a common origin from 

 the single species of Brassica above mentioned. 



The principal varieties of this plant are : 



1. The White Cahhage, (Brassica oleracea 

 capitata), with firm compact conical head, 

 glaucous green externally, blanched within, fi-om 

 two to twelve and fifteen inches in diameter. 



2. Red Cahhage, (B. O. rubra), of similar form 

 to the white, but of a purple or red colour. 



3. Savoy, (B. 0. sahauda), with wi-inkled 

 leaves, either open or formed into a compact 

 head; a winter vegetable. 



