KITCHEN-GARDEN VEGETABLES. 
recently been directed to it from another point 
of view—as a table vegetable. In America the 
cobs are taken as soon as the grains are plump, 
and boiled for about half an hour, more or less 
according to their age. Thus cooked, and eaten 
with salt and butter, they are highly esteemed, 
being considered fully equal to Peas. There 
is, however, nothing new in the cultivation of 
Maize being recommended for this purpose, for 
the celebrated William Cobbett in his English 
Gardener, published in 1829, wrote of it: “This 
is a very fine garden vegetable. The ear (cob) is 
stripped off the stalk just at the time when the 
grains are full of milk. The ears are then boiled 
449 
for about twenty minutes: they are brought to 
table whole; each person takes an ear, rubs over 
it a little butter and sprinkles it with a little 
salt, and bites the grains from the stalk to which 
they are attached, and which, in America, is 
called the cob. In the Indian Corn countries, 
every creature likes Indian Corn better than any 
other vegetable, not excepting even the fine 
fruits of those countries.” Cobbett also recom- 
mended it asa field crop. ‘Several of the sorts 
will seldom ripen well with the heat which they 
get in the state of New York, requiring that of 
Carolina or Virginia at least. Other sorts will 
ripen perfectly well as far north as Boston; and 
b 
Artichoke—Jerusalem White. 
there is a dwarf sort which will ripen equally 
on land 500 miles to the north of the last- 
mentioned place. Whether this be the same 
sort as that which I cultivate I do not exactly 
know, but mine never fails to come to perfection 
in England, be the summer what it may.” There 
are now in this country varieties which are 
doubtless much superior to that which Cobbett 
grew, some of the best of which are: Adam’s 
Early, Crosby’s Early Sugar, Country Gentle- 
man, Karly Dwarf Sugar, Early Metropolitan, 
Early Minnesota, Extra Early Tom Thumb, 
Moore’s Early Concord, and Triumphant Sweet. 
The culture of Indian Corn is very simple. 
The seeds should be sown in April in gentle 
heat, and planted out, 2 feet apart, in good soil 
in a sheltered sunny position. One of the modes 
pursued in America is to dig holes a foot square 
and 8 or 10 inches deep, in the end of May, fill 
them nearly to the surface level with rank 
strawy manure, cover this with an inch or two 
of soil, place five or six seeds in each, put on an 
inch of soil, reduce the number of plants to 
three, and allow these to grow on. 
Fig. 1205. 
Artichoke—Veitch’s Improved Long White. 
Jerusalem Artichoke (Helianthus tube- 
rosus) (fig. 1205). The Jerusalem Artichoke 
is a hardy tuberous-rooted perennial, and is 
closely related to the common Sunflower. 
It produces numerous fleshy tubers which are 
baked, roasted, or boiled, and served with milk 
or butter, and in various other ways. They are 
much liked by some persons, and their flavour, 
when properly cooked, is agreeable. The plant 
is also sometimes grown near preserves, for the 
winter-feeding of pheasants, which are very fond 
of the tubers. 
The Jerusalem Artichoke was one of the many 
plants recommended as a substitute for the 
Potato, and it is probably the best that has as 
yet been proposed. It is much more hardy than 
the Potato, as easily cultivated, thrives in the 
poorest soil and in the worst situations; and the 
nutritive value of the tubers is very consider- 
able. Sutton’s New White is an improved 
form with tubers of better flavour and more 
taking appearance than the old purple form. 
It grows well in a sandy loam, in an open 
situation. It is propagated by planting small 
