force-meat, and stuffed in the hollow part with
rice. It is then called dolma by the Turks, and
is in such general request that a large district in
the vicinity of Pera is called Dolma Baktché, or
Gourd Gardens, from the cultivation of these
plants. Then there is the Turk's-cap, crown
imperial, and elector's bonnet, like turbans or
other head-gear of brilliant colouring, which in
their young state, when about one-third grown,
furnish a wholesome though innutritious
vegetable; good for those who stand in terror of
making blood too fast. A variety of these, of
more prolific habit, has been cried up of late, and
it appears deservedly, as custard marrow.
Vegetable marrow is a not happy name for a variety
of gourd used for boiling and stewing, but
insipid at the best. In England, the common
mistake is to let all these grow much too big
before they are cut; when brought to table they
suggest the idea of a mess prepared for sailors
on their return from a long voyage, who stand in
need of a liberal dose of any vegetable whatsoever
to eradicate sea-scurvy from their system.
There would be rabbit smothered with onions at
top, and Jolly Jack Tar smothered with vegetable
marrow at bottom. The Italians bake
gourds in an oven, and then serve them out in
cold slices, like cake; it is a poor substitute for
true melon, though perhaps more digestible.
Their mode of cooking immature gourds is by
far the most palatable; they cut them when they
are as big as a large sausage or a turkey's egg,
they split them lengthwise, and fry them with
the skin on, in plenty of boiling oil or fat. The
little half gourds should come out of their bath
crusted with a delicate light-brown pellicle, and
not in the least greasy, but like first-rate French
sautéd potatoes. "Squash" is a picturesque
Americanism for the same tribe of vegetables, of
which they have a considerable variety. There
are even miniature gourds, grown solely for
ornament, to place on chimney-pieces and
knick-knack shelves; as the apple gourd, the pear
gourd, the orange gourd, and other little
prettinesses—to all which gourds, both great and
small, your garden-doors must be firmly though
reluctantly closed, if you wish your next year's
melons to maintain their repute for perfume and
flavour.

The melon, Cucumis melo, belongs to
the Linnæan class Monœcia, order Monadelphia;
which means, in English: Class One
House, order One Brotherhood. In the
majority of flowering plants, the fertilising organs,
or anthers, and the fruit-producing organs
or ovules, are borne in the same flower. These
constitute nearly the whole of the Linnæan
classes. But observing that, in certain cases,
the anthers and the ovules are produced
separately, in different flowers on the same individual
plant—which takes place with the filbert and
the melon—the great naturalist grouped them
into his One-house class, in distinction to Diœcia,
or Two-house, wherein the anthers and the
ovules are found not only in different flowers
but on different plants, as is seen in hemp, the
willow, and the date palm; one plant producing
anthers only and never seed or fruit, another
bearing seed or fruit only and never anthers.

In the natural system of Jussieu, the melon
belongs to the family of Cucurbitaceæ, or the
gourd family, herbaceous, or rarely wooded
climbing plants, furnished with tendrils which
help them to mount over brake and briar, and in
which are included, besides the genera Cucumis
and Cucurbita, the poisonous Momordica, or
squirting cucumber; the big-rooted bryony of
the hedge, which used to lend itself to the
fabrication of false portents; the very curious and
detestable Trichosanthes, or snake cucumber, with
its twisted fruit, sometimes six feet long; and
the useful, though uneatable, Lagenaria, or
calabash, a gigantic variety of which will hold a
couple of gallons of water. It hence appears
that the melon, if not the representative, is
certainly the best to eat of its family. The spiral
vessels of the melon are an instructive microscopic
object, as are also its jointed hairs covered
with scars.

To clear our literary melon ground before
beginning in earnest, we will exclude from it, first,
all water-melons, which are not melons except
by courtesy, but are Citrullus gourds, Pastèques,
and Cocomeros. Instead of having a hollow in
their middle containing the seeds, they are fleshy,
or rather spongy, throughout, the seeds being
embedded in the tissue. Although almost a
necessary of life during tropical, and even
Mediterranean, summers, when they serve as food and
drink combined, they are not wanted in the
British Islands. They are too insipid to be
worth growing as luxuries; their size is unwieldy
on the table, while their smooth dark-green skin,
and the absence of ribs, warts, or network, render
them anything but picturesque or ornamental in
the dish. The specimens we receive from Spain
and Portugal towards the close of autumn, are
imported stomach-ache. If a turnip grew on a
leafy running stem, it would take higher rank than
melons like these. Should you wish to grow
water-melons as a curiosity, sow them on a hot-bed
very early; and, after stopping the leading
shoot to make the side-shoots start, let them run
and spread as they please without further
interference, remembering that they must have plenty
of room, sunshine, air, and water. The French
in Algeria stick a water-melon seed into a hole
in the ground, and take no further thought of it
till they want a juicy fruit to moisten their
lips.

Neither have we anything to do with
precocities, with forced melons, with melons in April,
or May, or June. Our affair is with melons only
in their season, as they come naturally, so to
speak. We look no further, or no earlier, than
melons which ripen in August, September, and
October, and as much longer as skilful gardening,
a kindly season, and careful housewifery
can persuade them to last. We want melons
for the million, and not melons for the upper
ten-thousand, at a guinea and upwards a piece,
and not dear at the price either. We want to
turn the sun to good account and to make the
most economical use of his rays, instead of heaping