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LVIII. On the Degeneracy of the larger and finer Varieties 

 of Persian Melons, in the climate of England. By 

 Thomas Andrew Knight, Esq. F. R. S. fyc. President. 



Read November 3, 1829. 



It is a generally received, and I believe a well founded 

 opinion, that those varieties of Melons, which have long been 

 cultivated in the climate of England, of which the rind is hard 

 and thick, and the flesh highly coloured, do not now degene- 

 rate ; and those persons, who hold the merits of those varieties 

 in the same degree of estimation that I do, will think with 

 me, that they are tolerably safe from all danger of becoming 

 much worse than they now usually are. They are, however, 

 good enough for the purpose to which I see them usually 

 applied, that of being looked at only ; for out of a hundred 

 pounds weight of such fruit, which I have seen laid upon the 

 tables of my friends, within the last ten years, I am certain 

 that not one pound has been eaten. Some of the green- 

 fleshed varieties possess, it must be admitted, more merit ; 

 but all these, which I have seen, have been greatly inferior, 

 both in taste and flavour, to the large Persian varieties, which 

 have lately been introduced by this Society, and which had 

 been imported at former periods, but had ceased to be culti- 

 vated, or known. The first kind which I saw (it was about 

 thirty years ago) of these Persian varieties, was one of globu- 

 lar form, of an intensely bright colour, and perfectly white 

 flesh. Its common weight was nearly eight pounds, and its 



