214 
IMPROVEMENT OF CULINARY VEGETABLES. 
experience, each of these plants have become of the greatest importance, 
as forming a considerable portion of the food of man. We have no 
early records to inform ns by what gradual steps these valuable changes 
took place ; but we can judge, and with much certainty too, that such 
improvements happened in former times, as they do now : a new variety 
makes its appearance unexpectedly and accidentally ; the experienced 
eye marks the stranger; it is guarded and cherished, and its seeds or 
roots are saved, re-sown or re-planted, and henceforth takes an upper 
place among its congeners, and is regarded accordingly. 
In tropical countries, where interminable woods and jungle prevail, 
fruits of various kinds supply the indolent natives with the principal 
part of their food; animal diet is but little used or cared for ; but in 
higher latitudes this is the chief, but alvvays eked out by the wholesome 
grain, herb, or nutritious root; the latter often partaken of alone, and 
used as a substitute for bread. The hardiness of most of our tuberous 
and other culinary vegetables has made them particularly suitable for 
northern climates, as in no part of the world can they be grown in such 
perfection (except onions, perhaps) as between the forty-eighth and 
fifty-eighth degrees of north latitude; nor has any other country, not 
excepting even Italy itself, produced greater variety of kitchen vege¬ 
tables than have been brought into cultivation in the north of Europe. 
That most of our new and superior varieties have originated acci¬ 
dentally is a well-known fact, because it is only of late years that the 
doctrine of hybridisation of plants has been so well understood, practi¬ 
cally proved, and explained. This doctrine is now very generally 
known ; already has it been of the greatest service to florists and 
orchardists; and even farmers are partaking of the benefits to be 
derived from cross-impregnation, by gaining superior sorts of corn, and 
forage-plants for cattle *. Hence it naturally occurs to every one 
who considers what has already resulted from chance in our present 
improved stock of culinary vegetables, why many of them may not be 
still further improved by manual assistance. 
This subject was, some years ago, strongly recommended and pressed 
upon the attention of practical men by Mr. Bishop, in his “ Casual 
Botany”—a book in which there is much originality, but too little 
known, and too little attended to. Mr. Bishop’s ideas, however, should 
not be allowed to sleep, or be neglected; every practical man may 
take up the expedient of cross-impregnation by way of experimental 
* In proof of this assertion, it has been just announced in the Quarterly Journal of 
Agriculture, that a new hybrid turnip has been raised'by J. Wright, Esq., of Lawton, in 
Perthshire; and a new variety”of barley has been detected, and cultivated for three years 
by the intelligent Mr. Gorrie, of Annat, in the same county. 
