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MISCELLANEOUS VEGETABLES.
It is the earliest, hardiest, and most productive of all varie-
ties. The plants frequently produce five or six fruits each ;
but the first formed are generally the largest.
If sown in the open ground early in May, the plants will
often perfect a portion of their fruit ; but they are most pro-
ductive when started in a hot-bed.
The fruit is sometimes eaten cooked in the manner of the
Purple varieties, but is less esteemed.
MARTYNIA.
Unicorn Plant. Gray. Martynia proboscidea.
A hardy, annual plant, with a strong, branching stem two
feet and a half or three feet high. The leaves are large,
heart-shaped, entire or undulated, doAvny, viscous, and of a
peculiar, musk-like odor when bruised or roughly handled ;
the flowers are large, bell-
shaped, somewhat two-
lipped, dull-white, tinged
or spotted with yellow
and purple, and produced
in long, leafless racemes,
or clusters ; the seed-pods
are green, very downy or
hairy, fleshy, oval, an inch
and a half in their great-
est diameter, and taper
The Martynia. tO a ldlg, COllipa HI t . \ Ay
slender, incurved horn, or beak. The fleshy, succulent
character of the pods is of short duration: they soon become
fibrous, the elongated beak splits at the point, the two parts
diverge, the outer green covering falls off, and the pod be-