118 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Asparagus. — Asparagus officinalis, L., natural order 

 Liliacece. This occurs wild on the coasts of Wales, Cornwall, 

 Dorset, and the Channel Isles. In the southern parts of Russia 

 and Poland the waste steppes are covered with it, and it is there 

 eaten by horses and cattle as grass.* It was highly esteemed by 

 the ancient Greeks and Romans 200 B.c.t It has been long 

 cultivated in England. Gerarde (1597) figures five kinds, one 

 only being the garden Asparagus. It is one of the few vegetables 

 which has remained true to the wild form for upwards of two 

 thousand years of cultivation. 



Foliage. 



Cabbage. — Brassica oleracea, L., natural order Cruciferce. 

 It is a native of the coasts of England and Wales, of the Channel 

 Islands, and of W. and S. Europe. Theophrastus (300 b.c.) 

 knew of three kinds only — the loose broad-leaved, the closely- 

 packed, and the crisped-leaved. Pliny in the first century a.d. 

 mentions several varieties, and says that they were the most 

 highly esteemed of all garden vegetables. Eighty-seven remedies 

 were credited to the Cabbage. He tells us that " small shoots 

 thrown out from the main stem, of a more delicate and tender 

 quality than the Cabbage itself, were cut in spring."t Pliny also, 

 alluding to the " Arcinian Cabbage," says : " Beneath nearly of 

 all the leaves there were small shoots peculiar to this variety." 

 It would seem from the description that this form corresponded 

 with the kind described and figured by Gerarde, viz. No. 7, 

 Brassica prolifera, " the double Colewort." He says : " Double 

 Colewoort hath many and large leaues whereupon do grow heere 

 and there other small iagged leaues, as it were made of ragged 

 shreds and iaggs set vpon the smooth leafe, which giueth shewe 

 of a plume or faune of feathers." 



It somewhat resembles the fringed Primroses and Cyclamen 

 flowers, § and appears to be due to hypertrophy coupled with a 

 multiplication of the fibro -vascular cords of the midribs, &c. In 



* Treas. of Bot. " Asparagus." 



f After gathering the berries for sowing, the stems were burnt down ; the 

 ash was therefore restored to the beds (Pliny, Nat. Hist. bk. xix. 42.) 



J Bk. xix. c. 41. Cymcc, or " Sprouts." Mr. Sturtevant regards them 

 as flowering shoots. If so, it would refer to some form of Broccoli 

 (Amer. Nat. 1887, vol. xxi. p. 438). 



§ Described and figured in the Gardeners 1 Chronicle, 1885, vol. xxiii. 

 p. 536. 



