RHUBARB CULTIVATED NEAR BANBURY. 
201 
in the ground, and does best in a light sandy soil* If it 
were allowed (if they could afford to let it) to grow longer 
it would be all the finer and better. It is dug up in the 
month of October, or sometimes November. The root stock 
is what they call "trimmed" in large pieces (as specimens 
sent.) The root branches ("fibres") go into the market as 
u cuttings." The third form in which it enters into com- 
merce is that of " raspings " these being the produce of the 
process of "trimming." The cuttings are most likely to 
acquire the name of the "stick English rhubarb" 
5. The slicing, &c, I must defer till further information 
can be obtained, observing that I believe there is some pre- 
caution necessary in barking or stripping the root, so as not 
to pull off more than the true rind. 
The root is dried in " drying-houses," heated by stove 
pipes or brick flues. The root when prepared for the dry- 
ing house, is placed on a flat piece of basket work — some 
three feet long by two feet wide, and that is suspended by 
means of strings from above, over the pipe or flue — first at 
a considerable elevation (similar shelves containing root in 
a more advanced condition intervening), and gradually 
nearer as the process matures. There is great care requisite 
in conducting the process of drying— in graduating it ; for 
if the root in a recent condition were subjected to the tem- 
perature to which it should be subjected in the final stage, 
it would become unsaleable, and they say "black in the in. 
side" The "cuttings," "fibres," or root-branches, are 
pierced and strung, and so hung up in the drying-house. 
The trimmed are pierced only lo give them uniformity of 
appearance with the foreign. 
6. Of the leaves, I believe no use is now made, except 
the use common to all vegetable offal — manuring. The leaf 
stalks are now very partially sold for the table. In former 
* Mr. Atkins, of Northampton, who is an authority on such things 
in general, says that a cool rich soil suits it best. 
IS* 
