JASMINE. 315 



In the market they would find one bunch 

 of jasmine flowers would bring them as much 

 money as three cabbages or a bunch of tur- 

 nips. — As long back as the time of Charles the 

 Second, Evelyn says, " Were it as much em- 

 ployed for nosegays, &c, with us, as it is in 

 Italy and France, they might make money 

 enough of the flowers ; one sorry tree in Paris, 

 where they abound, has been worth to a poor 

 woman near a pistole a year." And at the pre- 

 sent time a great deal of money is made by 

 the nurserymen in that neighbourhood, who 

 trim them up with a head on a single stem, and 

 then pot them, and send them to the flower- 

 market covered with blossoms, where they 

 soon find customers amongst those who are 

 wise enough to prefer familiar beauty to costly 

 rarity ; and you see it there flourishing equally 

 in the cobbler's window and the palace bal- 

 cony. The Turks cultivate the jasmine for 

 the sake of the branches, of which the tubes 

 of their summer tobacco-pipes are as invari- 

 ably made, as those for the winter are formed 

 of the cherry-tree. 



As the jasmine does not ripen its seed in 

 our climate, it is increased by laying down 

 the branches, which take root in one year ; 

 which may then be cut from the old stock, and 

 planted where they are to remain. It is also 



