] History of Garden Vegetables. 671 
t-stock, gathered before the plant flowered, was formerly used 
I table vegetable. It does not appear to have ever reached 
lerican gardens or use. 
Both the word melon and pepon have been used in a generic 
sense, and sometimes as synonymous. Albertus Magnus,^- in the 
thirteenth century, says, melons, which some call pepones, have 
the seed and the flower very nearly like those of the cucumber, 
and also says in speaking of the cucumber that the seeds are like 
those of the pepo. Under the head of the watermelon, citrullus, 
he calls it pepo, with a smooth, green skin, but the pepo is 
commonly yellow and of an uneven surface, and as if round 
semicircular sections were orderly arranged together. In 1 5 36 
Reullius*'* describes our melon as the pepo ; in 1542 Fuchsius** 
describes the melon, but figures it under the name of pepo. In 
1550 Roszlin*'^ figures the melon under the name oi pepo, and in 
1558 Matthiolus^ figures it under the name of melon. The 
Greek name of pepon, and the Italian, German, Spanish, and 
French of melon, variously spelled, are given among synonyms 
by various authors'"" of the sixteenth century, and melones sive 
pepones are used by Pinaeus in 1561,^'' melone snd pepone by Cas- 
tor Durante^^ in 161 7, and by Gerarde *^ in England, in 1597. 
Melons and pompions are used synonymously, and the melon is 
called muske-melon or million. 
Whether the ancients knew the melon is a mattter of doubt. 
Dioscorides,'^ in fhe first century, says the flesh or pulp (cara) of 
the pepo used in food is diuretic. Pliny ,'''^ about the same period, 
says a new form of cucumber has lately appeared in Campania 
called melopepo, which grows on the ground in a round form, and 
he adds, as a remarkable circumstance, in addition to their color 
1867, 501. Epit., 1586. 296, etc. 
« Ruellius. De Nat. Stirp., 1536. 503. ^ Castor Durante. Herb., 1617, 345. 
