CRESS, GARDEN. 



81 



The same writer informs us how they manage their cress 

 plantations near Paris. " Having there," he says, " no run- 

 ning water, they cultivate it in the neighbourhood of wells, 

 and water it every day. The cress vegetates promptly, but 

 becomes acrid in its taste. They accordingly prefer sow- 

 ing to planting, because, if cut when only six inches high, 

 and treated, in all respects, as an annual, it has least of this 

 pungency. " — Armstrong'^ s Treatise, 



Loudon says, " Some market gardeners, who can com- 

 mand a small stream of water, grow the water-cress in beds 

 sunk about a foot in a retentive soil, with a very gentle slope 

 from one end to the other. Along the bottom of this bed, 

 which may be of any convenient breadth and length, chalk 

 or gravel is deposited, and the plants are inserted about six 

 inches' distance every way. Then, according to the slope 

 and length of the bed, dams are made six inches high across 

 it, at intervals; so that, when these dams are full, the v/ater 

 may rise not less than three inches on all the plants included 

 in each. The water being turned on will circulate from 

 dam to dam ; and the plants, if not allowed to run to ilower, 

 will afford abundance of young tops in all but the v/intei 

 months. A stream of water, no larger than what vv ill fill 

 a pipe of one inch bore, will, if not absorbed by the soil 

 suffice to irrigate in this way an eighth of an acrt. Ab 

 some of the plants are apt to rot off in winter, the plantation 

 should be laid dry two or three times a year, and all weeds 

 and decayed parts removed, and vacancies filled up. 

 Cress grown in this way, however, is far inferior to that 

 grown in a living stream flowing over gravel or chalk." 



Use. — " Water-cresses are universally used and eaten as 

 an early and wholesome spring salad. Being an excellent 

 antiscorbutic and stomachic, they are nearly allied to scurvy 

 grass, but do not possess so great a degree of acrimony. 

 They are also supposed to purify the blood and humours, 

 and to open visceral obstructions." — Dom, Encyc, 



CRESS, GARDEN. — Lepidium sativum, — The garden- 

 cress is a hardy, annual plant, cultivated, says Loudon, since 

 1548; but its native country is unknown. 



Varieties, — 



Curled, or peppergrass, | Broad-leaved garden cress. 



This plant is raised from seed, of which one ounce will 

 suffice for a bed of four feet square. 



Times of sowing^ and site of the crop, — Cress should be 

 raised three or four times every month, as it may be in de- 



