ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF OUR GARDEN VEGETABLES. 119 



mangold, and first raised from seed by Dr. Lettsom in 1786. Mr. L. 

 Phillips, an experimentalist at Vauxhall, received a gold medal from 

 the Society for the Encouragement of Arts " for his successful exer- 

 tions in extending the culture of the variety of beet known as mangold 

 wurzel, &c." Numerous varieties appeared subsequently. The three 

 principal varieties now grown as the garden and sugar beets and the 

 mangold wurzel are all very wholesome on account of the sugar which 

 they contain. Dr. Lyon Playfair suggested that a good brown bread 

 could be made by rasping down beet-roots with an equal quantity of 

 flour, observing that the average quality of flour contains about 12 per 



Fig. 54. — Wild Beet (perennial). Quarter natural size. 



cent, of nitrogenous matter and the average quality of beet only 

 2 per cent. The garden beet and the variety of sugar beet of France 

 are about equal in value in sugar, containing 10 per cent., the water in 

 the root being upwards of 82 per cent. Some sugar beets, however, 

 contain a much higher percentage of sugar. The albuminoids or nitro- 

 genous matters being only 0*4 per cent., the nutrient ratio is 1 : 29, the 

 nutrient value 12. 



Careot. 



This is a native wild plant, Baucus Carota, L., of botanists, and 

 common everywhere. It is known as " Bird's nests " in the country 

 from the peculiar way in which the umbel bearing the fruit curls 

 inwards into a cup-like form (fig. 55). 



