MELON

MELON, in botany, a species of CUCUMIS *, in the Linnean system. The female flowers have no stamens or summits, but have a very large oval germin, situated below the flower, which turns to an oval fruit with several cells, filled with oval, acute-pointed, compressed seeds, inclosed in a soft pulp. There is a great variety of this fruit cultivated in different parts of the world, many of them of no value, size being regarded too much in the markets. The Cantaloupe melon, so called from a place in the neighbourhood of Rome, where this fruit has been long cultivated, and whither it was brought from Armenia, is in the greatest esteem among the curious in every part of Europe. Besides this, there are also the romana, the succada, the Zatte, the small Portugal dormer, and the black Galloway melon, most of which are cultivated for an early crop. The proper management and culture of melons are as follow: the seeds should be procured from good melons, of the soundest sort and highest flavour, produced, as some have advised, in a distant garden; for if sown on the place where it was raised and ripened, it is very apt to degenerate. This seed should be kept three years before it is sown, but not more than six; and it should be sown at two seasons, or if at three it will be still better: the first for the early crop, to be raised under frames, should be sown about the middle of February; the second, to be raised in the same manner, is to be sown about the middle of March; and those which are designed for hand or bell-glasses, or to be covered with oil-papers, should not be sown till about a week in April. For those of the first season, the seeds may be sown on the upper side of a cucumber-bed, if there be any; or, a proper quantity of new loose dung must be provided, and thrown on a heap to ferment, and turned over, that it may acquire an equal heat; and the plants must be raised and managed like cucumbers, until they are planted where they are to remain. The beds or ridges, where the plants are to remain, should be placed in a warm situation, so that they may be defended from all cold and strong winds, and inclosed in a good reed fence. In preparing the earth for these plants, the Dutch and German gardeners form a mixture of a third part of hazel loam, a third part of the scouring of ditches and ponds, and the same quantity of very rotten dung; which they mix up at least one, and often two years, before they make use of it, frequently turning it over, so that the parts may be well incorporated; but the compost in which Mr Miller has found melon plants to succeed best in England is two-thirds of fresh gentle loam, and one-third of rotten neat's dung: if these are mixed together one year before it is wanted, so as to have the benefit of a winter's frost and summer's heat, observing to turn it over often, and never suffering weeds to grow upon it, this will be found equal to any compost whatever. Before the plants appear, there should be a quantity of new dung thrown in a heap, allowing about 15 wheelbarrows full to each light; which must be turned over two or three times, and in a fortnight it will be fit for use; when the trench must be dug to receive the dung where the bed is designed to be made, which in a dry ground should not be less than a foot or a foot and a half deep. The frames should then be placed over the bed to keep out the wet; but no earth should be laid upon it for three or four days, till it is found of a proper temperature of heat. When this is the case, the earth may be laid upon it, about two inches thick, except in the middle of each light, where the plants are to be placed, which must be raised into a hill 15 inches high or more, terminating in a flat cone: in two or three days after the earth is put on the bed, it will be of a proper temper to receive the plants; which should be carefully taken up with a trowel, so as to preserve all the fibres of their roots; or if the beds cannot be ready for them in time, soon after the third or fourth leaf is put out, it will be a good method to put each plant into a small pot while they are young, and these may be plunged into the hot-bed where they were raised, or in a cucumber-bed, where there is room; and when the bed is ready, the plants may be turned out of the pots, with the whole ball of earth to their roots: and this is the best method for the Cantaloupe melon. When the plants are placed on the tops of the hills, they should be gently watered once or twice, till they have taken good root; and when they are well fixed in the new beds, a greater quantity of earth should be laid on the beds, pressed down as close as possible, and raised at least a foot and a half thick upon the dung all over the bed; observing also to raise the frames, that the glasses may not be too near the plants, lest the sun should scorch them. When the plants have four leaves, the top of the plants should be pinched off with the finger and thumb, that they may put out lateral branches for producing the fruit; and when two or more of these lateral shoots are produced, they must also be pinched to force out more. The management of these beds is much the same as that of cucumbers, except that melons require more air and very little water. In five or six weeks the plants will spread over the bed, and reach to the frames, when the alleys between the beds should be dug out; or in case of one bed, a trench should be made on each side about four feet wide, as low as the bottom of the bed; and hot dung wheeled in for a lining, to the same height as the dung of the bed; this should be trodden down close, and covered with the same earth that was laid on the bed, to the thickness of a foot and a half or more, treading it down as close as possible. In this way the bed will be extended to the width of 12 feet, that the roots of the plants may spread quite through it; and the beds will also require a fresh warmth, which will be of great service in setting of the fruit. When the vines have extended so as to fill the frames, and want more room, the frames should be raised up with bricks about three inches high, to admit the shoots of the vines to run out under them. When the fruit appears, the vines should be carefully looked over three times a week; and one should be chosen upon each runner that is situated nearest the stem, having the largest foot-stalk, and appearing to be the strongest fruit; then pinch off all the other fruit which may appear upon the same runner, and pinch off the end of the runner at the third joint above the fruit; and if the runner is gently pinched at the next joint above the fruit, it will stop the sap and set the fruit. There is also another method practised by some gardeners to set this fruit, which is the taking off some of the male flowers, whose farina is just ripe and fit for the purpose, laying them over the female fruit, and gently striking with the nails the male flowers, to shake the farina into the female flowers; whereby they are impregnated, and the fruit will soon after swell, and manifest visible signs of being perfectly set; so that where the plants are under frames, and the wind excluded from them, which is wanted to convey the farina from the male to the female flowers, this practice may be very necessary. The glasses of the hot-bed should also be raised high, to admit a large share of air to the plants, otherwise the fruit will not set; and if the season should prove very warm, the glasses may be frequently drawn off, especially in an evening, to receive the dews, provided there is little wind stirring: but they should not remain off the whole night, lest the cold should prove too great. When the plants have extended themselves from under the frames, in cold weather their extremities should be covered every night with mats, and the plants should be watered once in a week in dry warm weather, in the alleys between the beds. For those melons that are raised under bell or hand-glasses, the plants should be raised in the manner already directed, and about the latter end of April, in a forward season, the beds may be made. For this purpose, a sufficient quantity of hot-dung should be provided, allowing eight or nine good wheel-barrows of dung to each glass. For one bed extended in length, the trench should be cut out three-one-half feet wide, and of such a length, that the glasses may not be placed nearer than four feet to each other: in digging the trench, it should be so situated, as to allow for the widening of the bed three or four feet on each side; the depth must depend on the nature of the soil; and when there is no danger of the beds being injured by the wet, the lower it is made the better. When the dung, prepared as before, is laid on the bed, there should be a hill for each plant, one foot and a half high, and the other part need not be covered more than four inches thick; the glasses should then be placed over the hills, and in two or three days after the beds are made they will be fit for receiving the plants, which should be removed in the manner already directed. These plants must be watered at first, to settle the earth to their roots, and shaded every day, till they have taken new root; and if the nights prove cold, it will be proper to cover the glasses with mats, in order to preserve the warmth of the bed. If several beds are made, they should be placed at eight feet distance from each other. When the plants have taken good root, their tops must be pinched off, and the pruning must be the same as for those under frames. In the day-time, when the weather is warm, the glasses should be raised on the opposite side to the wind, to admit fresh air to the plants; and when they reach the sides of the glasses, in favourable weather the glasses must be set up on three bricks, that the vines may have room to run out under them; but when this is done, the beds should be covered all over with earth to the depth of one foot and an half, and trod down as close as possible; and in cold nights, the beds should be covered with mats. And as the vines of the Cantaloupe melons cannot bear wet without injury, it will be necessary to arch the beds over with props to support the mats, that they may be ready for covering at all times when they require it. If the weather should prove cold, hot dung may be laid to these beds in the manner directed for those under frames. Some have lately raised their melons with considerable success under oiled paper; but great care must be taken not to keep these coverings too close over them. And Miller advises to bring up the plants under hand or bell glasses, till they begin to extend themselves under the glasses, and then, instead of the covering of mats, to put over them the paper done over with linseed oil. The farther management of melons, after their fruit is set, is to keep pulling off all the superfluous fruit, and to pinch off all weak runners; and also to turn the fruit gently twice a-week, that each side may have equal benefit of the sun and air. When the fruit is fully grown, care should be taken to cut it at a proper time; for if it is left a few hours upon the vines, it will lose much of its delicacy; therefore the vines should be looked over at least twice in a day: and if the fruit intended for the table is cut early in the morning, before the sun has warmed it, it will be much better flavoured; but if it should be necessary to cut any afterwards, it should be put into cold spring water or ice to cool it, before it is brought to table; and that cut in the morning should be kept in the coolest place till it is used. The signs of this fruit's maturity is, its beginning to crack near the foot-stalk, and its beginning to smell, which never fail: but the Cantaloupe melons seldom change their colour till they are too ripe. Mr Reynolds has communicated to the Society of Arts the following method of raising melons without earth, dung, or water. About a month before the seeds are sown, he prepares a bed of cast-off tanner's bark, four feet deep, six feet wide, and twelve feet in length: this he covers with four lights, so as not to admit rain or water. March (he says) is a proper season for this purpose. When the bed becomes warm, which generally happens in about 20 days, a few melon seeds are put into warm milk in an earthen vessel, which is pressed down into the bark-bed, where it remains 36 hours, in order to promote the vegetation of the seeds. Then, at equal distances, he directs to open four holes in the bed, each nine inches in diameter, and five inches deep; having in readiness about a peck of pounded bark, like saw-dust, some of it to be put at the bottom of the holes, to the thickness of three inches: on this bark some of the seeds are to be placed, and pressed down with the fingers; then the seeds are to be covered with two inches more of the powdered bark, pressing the whole down with the hand. When the plants are advanced to a proper size, the best are chosen and the others cast away; those that are reserved are ordered to be properly pruned, and to have as much warm air as possible during the summer. In this way (he says) he has raised as good melons as can be desired. When a melon is perfectly fine, it is full, without any vacuity: this is known by knocking upon it; and when cut, the flesh must be dry, no water running Melon out, only a little dew, which is to be of a fine red colour. Large melons are not to be coveted, but firm and well-flavoured ones. Our gardeners who raise melons for sale, sow the seeds of the larger rather than the good kinds, and they increase the size of these by much watering the roots; but this spoils the taste. Some of the French raise at this time particularly fine melons, by a method kept as a secret, but which we find, on a strict inquiry, is no other than the ingenious Mr Quintiny's of that nation, published near 80 years ago in our Philosophical Transactions. The melons particularly proper to be treated in this manner, are those which have a thin and somewhat embroidered skin, not divided by ribs, and have a red pulp, dry and melting on the tongue, not mealy, and of a high flavour. These are what succeed in the following method, and are greatly improved in size and flavour by it. When the seeds of this melon are placed in the ground, the first thing that appears is a pair of feminal leaves, or ears, as the gardeners call them. Between these two leaves there shoots, some days after, a leaf called the first leaf or knot; and out of the same place, after some days more, there shoots another leaf, called the second knot. Out of the midst of this stalk of the second knot, there shoots a third knot; this third knot must be cut off at its insertion, without hurting the branch of the second knot from whence it grows. Out of this place there will grow, after this cutting, a branch, which will be what the gardeners call the first arm; and this arm will, in the same manner as the first plant, shoot out, first one, then a second, and then a third knot; this third knot must be cut again as before, and thus the third knots are all along to be cut off, and arms or branches will grow up in the places of them all the way in the same manner as the first; and it is at those arms that the melons will be produced, and they will be always good, if the foot or root be well nourished in good earth, and cherished by a good hot-bed and the sun. The foot of the melon must never be suffered to pass into the dung, and the earth must not be watered but moderately, when it is seen to grow too dry; but in this case, it must be moderately moistened in time, lest the shoot suffer by it. Twice or thrice a-week is often enough to water in the driest weather, and this must always be done about sunset; and when the heat of the sun is too violent, the melons must be covered with straw mats from 11 in the morning to about two in the afternoon. When it rains much, the melons must also be covered, lest it hurt them by too much moisture. (Philosoph. Trans. no. 47.)—If the root produce too many branches, the weakest are to be cut off, and only three or four left; and those which are left are to be such as have their knots closest to one another. When the plants are removed from the seed-bed to the places where they are to stand, if they are very strong, they should be planted single; but if otherwise, two are to be set in each hole. When they are planted single, the two branches, which always grow on each side from the base of the feed-leaves, are to be left on; but when two plants are set together, these branches are to be cut off, otherwise all the branches will be too numerous, and they will entangle and spoil one another. When the melons are knit, two of them only are to be left upon each foot, choosing those which are best placed, and next to the first and principal stalk, that is, to the heart of the foot. None but fair fruits are to be left, and such as have a thick and short tail; and the foot of the melon must be short, well trussed, and not far distant from the ground. Melons of a long stem, and having the stalk of the leaf too long and slender, are never vigorous. All the superfluous branches must be cut off from time to time, as they shoot out. There sometimes shoot out a branch more than is here mentioned, between the two feed-leaves or ears. If this is strong and vigorous, it is to be kept on, but if weakly, it is best to take it off, for it will never bear good fruit. Water-Melon. See ANGURIA.