MINT, MUSHROOM. 



Ill 



unless it weigh fifteen or sixteen. I raised some of these once 

 very well at Botley from seed that was brought from Malta. They 

 are a totally different thing from the other tribe ; and, being so 

 much better, 1 have often wondered that, where people have great 

 space under glass, and great heat at command, they do not raise 

 them in England. There is only one hne musk melon that I ever 

 saw in America ; which is called the citron melon, having the flesh 

 nearly white and being of the shape of a lemon. The mode of cul- 

 tivating the water-melon is the same as that of cultivating the 

 other ; but it requires more room. If you wish to save the seed of 

 melons, you must take it out when you eat the fruit, and do with it 

 precisely as is directed in the case of the cucumber seed : but, to 

 have the seed true to its kind, it must not be saved on a spot near 

 to that in which grow, and have blowed, cucumbers, squashes, 

 pumpkins, or anything of that sort ; nor on a spot where any other 

 sort of melon has been in bloom at the same time. The greatest 

 possible care must be taken in this respect, or you will have fruit 

 quite different from that which you expect. 



163. MINT. — There are two sorts : one is of a darker green 

 than the other : the former is QdWed. pepper -mint, and is generally 

 used for distilling to make mint water : the latter, which is called 

 spear-mint, is used for the table in many ways. The French snip 

 a little into their salads ; we boil a bunch amongst green peas, to 

 which it gives a pleasant flavour ; chopped up small, and put along 

 with sugar, into vinegar, we use it as a sauce for roasted lamh; 

 and a very pleasant sauce it is. Mint may be propagated from 

 seed ; but a few bits of its roots wiil spread into a bed in a year. 

 To have it in winter, preserve it precisely like marjoram (which 

 see), and instead of chopping it for sauce, crumble it between 

 your fingers. 



164. MUSHROOM. — This is one of a numerous tribe of fun- 

 guses ; but it is the only one that is cultivated for culinary purposes, 

 and this one is scarcely ever seen in any gardens but those of no- 

 blemen, or gentlemen of fortune. In their gardens it is cultivated 

 in order to be had at all times of the year, for everybody knows 

 that, in most parts of England, it comes up spontaneously in the 

 meadows and elsewhere. It is cultivated no-how but in hot-beds ; 

 but there in two distinct ways. The first is on hot-beds oz<^ of doors, 

 and the hot-bed is made and managed in the manner that I will 

 now describe. Take stable dung that is not fresh and fiery, or if 



