CUCUMIS MELO.-THE MELON. 
Class XXII. DICECIA. Order VII. POLYADELPHIA. 
Natural Order, CUCURBITACE^. THE GOURD TRIBE. 
Cucumis melo (Lin. spec. 1436.) stem trailing, scabrous, cirrhiferous ; leaves roundish, angular, petiolate; 
male flowers having the tube of the calyx rather ventricose at the base, and rather dilated at the apex ; 
stamens inclosed ; anthers shorter than their connectives : the hermaphrodite flowers with the anthers as in 
the males ; stigmas 3-4, shortly 2-lobed ; fruit ovate or sub-globose, 8- 1 2-furrowed ; flesh sugary, yellow, 
red, or white. 
Native of Asia. Called rhetimou by the Hindoos ; Melon, Engl, and Fr.; Melone, Germ.; Mellone, Ital. 
The melon is a tender annual, producing one of the richest fruits brought to the dessert, and has been 
cultivated in England since 1570, but the precise time of its introduction is unknown. It was originally 
brought to this country from Jamaica, and was, till within the last fifty years, called the musk-melon. The 
fruit, to be grown to perfection, requires the aid of artificial heat and glass throughout every stage of its 
culture. Its minimum temperature may be estimated at 65°, in which it will germinate and grow ; but it 
requires a heat of from 75° to 80° to ripen its fruit, which, in ordinary cases, it does in 4 months from the 
time of sowing the seed. 
Varieties. — There are numerous varieties, many of which, especially those raised from seeds brought 
from Italy and Spain, are not worth cultivating. The best sorts are included under the name of Cantaloups, 
an appellation bestowed on them from a seat of the Pope near Rome, where this variety is supposed to 
have been originally produced. The general character of the Cantaloups is a roundish form, rough, warty, 
or netted outer rind; neither very large in fruit or leaves. The Romanas, an Italian sort, are next in esteem, 
are generally oval-shaped, regularly netted ; the fruit and leaves middle-sized, and the plants great bearers. 
Many varieties of both these sorts, however, that were formerly in esteem, are now lost, degenerated, or 
supplanted by others of Spanish or Persian origin. 
Culture under hand-glasses. — A successive or late crop, to fruit in August and September, may be 
raised on hot-bed ridges under hand-glasses. Sow in a hot-bed from the middle of March to the middle of 
April. When the plants have been up a few days, while in the seed-leaves, prick some into small pots, two 
plants in each; water and plunge them into a hot-bed, managing as directed for the young frame plants, till 
the rough leaves are from 2-4 inches long, and the plants ready to shoot into runners. From the middle 
of March to the third week of May, when the plants are a month or five weeks old, they will be fit to ridge 
out under hand-glasses. With well-prepared stable-dung, or, with a mixture of fermented tree-leaves, 
build the hot-bed four feet wide and 2 \ feet thick, the length acccording to the number of glasses intended, 
allotting the space of 4 feet to each. In a week or ten days, or when the dung and leaves are brought to a 
sweet or well-tempered heat, mould the bed 10 or 12 inches thick, then place the glasses along the middle, 
and keep them close till the bed has warmed the earth. The same or next day, insert the plants ; turn 
them out from the pots with the ball of earth entire, and allotting plants for each glass, insert the ball into 
the earth, clean down over the top, closing the mould about the stems. Give a little water and place the 
glasses over close. From about nine in the morning till three in the afternoon, of the first two or three 
days, shade the plants till they have taken root, when admit the sun more freely, yet only by degrees from 
day to day, till they can bear it fully without flagging much. Give air daily, in temperate weather, by 
tilting the edge of the glasses on the south side, an inch or two; but in the present stage of the plants shut 
close at night. Cover ufith mats till morning, constantly keeping the glasses over. Give occasional 
moderate waterings with aired water. Cover in the day time with mats in bad weather, or heavy or cold 
rains; and continue the night covering until confirmed summer in July. Meanwhile attend to the heat of 
the bed ; if this be declined, so that the minimum temperature be not 65° at night, with the aid of matting, 
line the sides with hot dung, covered with a layer of mould. The revived heat from the linings will for- 
ward the plants in fruiting, while the earth at top will enlarge the surface for the runners, and the bed for 
the roots. When the runners have extended considerably and filled the glasses, they must be trained out. 
Accordingly, at the beginning of June, in favourable settled warm weather, train out the runners, cutting 
away dwindling and useless crowding shoots; then the glasses must be raised all round, 2 or 3 inches, upon 
props to remain day and night. Cover with mats in cold nights and bad weather, but first arch the bed 
