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XXVI. Description of the different Varieties of Parsneps, 

 cultivated in the Garden of the Horticultural Society of 

 London. By Mr, Andrew Mathews, A. L.S. 



Read December 6, 1825. 



The cultivated Parsneps are varieties of the Pastinaca 

 sativa* a native of England and other parts of Europe. The 

 wild plant differs from the cultivated ones in having a smaller 

 root, and in its leaves being downy underneath. The garden 

 Parsnep has been long used as a culinary vegetable, as well 

 as for the purposes of agriculture. As an esculent it is 

 sufficiently known and esteemed, but until lately, there has, 

 I believe, been but one kind in general cultivation in this 

 country. The following descriptions of the different varieties 

 at present grown in the Garden of the Horticultural Society 

 will therefore probably not be unacceptable. 



Dr. John M'Culloch is, I believe, the first writer who 

 has noticed more than one kind. In his Paper on the culti- 

 vation of Parsneps, addressed \ to the Caledonian Horticul- 

 tural Society, he mentions three kinds, viz. the Coquine, the 

 Lisbonaise and the Four que e, as being known in the Islands 

 of Guernsey and Jersey. Mr. Neill, the Secretary of the 

 Caledonian Horticultural Society, in his Treatise on Garden- 

 ing, published in the Edinburgh Encyclopaedia, mentions 



* English Botany, folio 556; and Smith's English Flora, Vol. ii. page 101. 

 f Transactions of the Caledonian Horticultural Society, Vol. i. page 405. 



