6 



CULINARY OR KITCHEN GARDEN. 



odour during the time they are handling 

 and preparing their food." 



Mustard must have been cultivated 

 in Syiia while our Saviour was upon 

 earth, as it is mentioned in one of His 

 beautiful parables as being the least seed 

 that was sown in the field. The mustard 

 here referred to does not appear, from the 

 circumstance of the size of its seed, to be 

 the mustard of our times. This has led 

 to various conjectures, none of which have 

 much plausibility. The mustard of the 

 present time was cultivated in Rome, in 

 Pliny'stime, to the extentof threevarieties. 



The origin or native country of the 

 well-known onion is unknown. Pliny, 

 in book 20, chap. 5, enumerates all the 

 countries from whence the Greeks as well 

 as the Romans procured different varieties 

 of this root, but declares he could never 

 discover where they ever grew wild. Pal- 

 ladius, a Greek physician, recommends 

 the onion ,to be sown with savory, in 

 which curious opinion Pliny agrees, ob- 

 serving that onions prosper better when 

 savory is sown with them. It was a cur- 

 rent opinion, we should state, in those 

 days, that certain plants had an antipathy 

 to, or a sympathy with, each other. How- 

 ever absurd such an idea may appear to 

 us, we should take into consideration that 

 the opinions of the ancients may not have 

 been faithfully handed down to us, or that 

 their works may admit of a somewhat i 

 different construction. " We find," Phil- 

 lips observes, " that all the plants which 

 they recommend to be sown or planted 

 together are of very opposite natures ; and 

 there may be more reason in the system 

 pursued by the ancients than is generally 

 allowed ; for plants drawing the same juice 

 from the earth must naturally weaken 

 each other; whereas those requiring dif- 

 ferent nutriment may, in some degree, 

 assist each other, each feeding on juices 

 that are prejudicial to plants of the other 

 species." In this there is great truth. 

 The garlic was in use at as early a time as 

 the onion ; the want of both was lamented 

 by the Israelites in the wilderness. The 

 Egyptians worshipped it, and are said to 

 wish that they may enjoy it in paradise. 

 The Greeks held it in such abhorrence, 

 that those who ate it were regarded as 

 profane. The Romans gave it to their 

 labourers to strengthen them, to their 

 soldiers to excite courage, and fed their 



game-cocks on it previous to fighting 

 them. The eschalot (or shallot, as it is 

 often written) is a species of onion, and 

 was well known to both the Greeks and 

 Romans. Pliny states, book 19, chap. 6, 

 that the best leeks were brought from 

 Egypt, and names Aricia, now called 

 Ricoia, in Italy, as celebrated for them in 

 his time, and says, " it is not long since 

 leeks were brought into great notice and 

 esteem by the Emperor Nero, who used 

 to eat them for several days in every 

 month to clear his voice, eating them 

 with oil only, and abstaining from bread 

 on those leek-eating days," which ab- 

 surdity led his people to give him the 

 cognomen of Porrophacfus. Pliny, book 

 20, chap. 11, informs us that parsley was 

 in great repute in his time, all classes 

 partaking of it largely in their pottage, 

 and that there was not a salad or sauce 

 presented at the table without it. The 

 Emperor Tiberius held parsnips in high 

 repute, and had them annually brought 

 to Rome from Germany, from the neigh- 

 bourhood of Gelduba on the Rhine, where 

 they were said to have been grown in 

 great perfection. The Greeks sowed their 

 pease in November ; the Romans did not 

 plant theirs tiU the spring. 



So highly did the ancient Greeks esteem 

 the radish, that, in offering their oblations 

 to Apollo, they presented turnips in lead, 

 and beet in silver, whereas radishes were 

 presented in beaten gold. The Greeks 

 appear to have been acquainted with three 

 varieties of this plant; andMoschian, one 

 of their chief physicians, wrote a whole 

 book on the radish alone, so highly did 

 he think of it. Pliny obsei-ves, that 

 radishes grow best in saline soils, or when 

 they are watered with salt-water; and 

 hence, he says, the radishes of Egypt are 

 better than any in the world, on account 

 of their being there supplied with nitre. 

 He gives some account of the kinds grown 

 at Rome in his day, one of which he 

 describes as being so clear and trans- 

 parent that one may see through them. 

 The transparent variety of our day has 

 not this property to the same extent. 

 The size also to which the radishes of 

 those days are said to have attained far 

 exceeded those of the present, nor do 

 we think such would be appreciated 

 by our modern radish-eaters. Tragus 

 mentions radishes that weighed 40 lb.; 



