the Cucumber; a genus of the syn-geneia order, belonging to the monoeia class of plants. In this genus Linnaeus includes also the Melon; (see that article). There are 11 species, of which the following are the most remarkable.

1. The sativa, or common cucumber, hath roots composed of numerous, long, slender, white fibres; long slender stalks, very branchy at their joints, trailing on the ground, or climbing by their clasps, adorned at every joint by large angular leaves on long erect footstalks, with numerous monopetalous bell-shaped flowers of a yellow colour, succeeded by oblong rough fruit. The varieties of this kind are,

(1.) The common rough green prickly cucumber; a middle-sized fruit, about six or seven inches long, having a dark-green rough rind, closely set with very small prickles; the plant is of the hardiest sort, but does not show its fruit early. (2.) The short green prickly cucumber is about three or four inches long; the rind rather smooth, and set with small black prickles. It is valuable chiefly for being one of the earliest and hardiest sorts. (3.) The long green prickly cucumber, grows from six to nine inches in length, and is rather thinly set with prickles. And as there is an early and late cucumber, it is considerably the best variety for the main crops, both in the frames and hand-glas, as well as in the open ground for prickleurs. Of this there is another variety with white fruit. (4.) The early green cluster cucumber is a shortish fruit, remarkable for growing in clusters, and appearing early. (5.) The long smooth green Turkish cucumber, is a smooth green-rinded fruit, growing from ten to fifteen inches in length, without prickles. The plants are strong growers, with very large leaves. (6.) The long smooth white Turkish cucumber, is a smooth-rinded fruit, from ten to fifteen inches long, without prickles. (7.) The large smooth green Roman cucumber is a very large and long smooth green fruit produced from a strong growing plant. (8.) The long white prickly Dutch cucumber, is a white fruit eight or ten inches long, set with small black prickles; the plants are but bad bearers in this country.

2. The chaata, or round-leaved Egyptian cucumber. According to Mr Haffelquitt, this grows in the fertile earth near Cairo after the inundation of the Nile, and not in any other place in Egypt, nor does it grow in any other soil. It ripens with the water-melons. The fruit is a little watery; the flesh almost of the same substance with the melons; it tastes somewhat sweet and cool; but is far from being as cool as the water-melons. This the grandees and Europeans in Egypt eat as the most pleasant fruit they find, and that from which they have the least to apprehend. It is the most excellent fruit of this tribe of any yet known.

The four first varieties of the cucumis sativa are those chiefly cultivated in this country. They are raised at three different seasons of the year: 1. on hot-beds, for early fruit; 2. under bell, or hand-glas, for the middle crop; 3. on the common ground, which is for a late crop, or to pickle. The cucumbers which are ripe before April are unwholesome; being raised wholly by the heat of the sun without the assistance of the sun. Those raised in April are good, and are raised in the following manner.

Towards the latter end of January, a quantity of fresh horse-dung must be procured with the litter among it; and a small proportion of sea-coal ashes should be added to it. In four or five days the dung will begin to heat; at which time a little of it may be drawn flat on the outside, and covered with two inches thickness of good earth; this must be covered with a bell-glas; and after two days, when the earth is warm, the seeds must be sown on it, covered with a quarter of an inch of fresh earth, and the glas then set on again. The glas must be covered with a mat at night, and in four days the young plants will appear. When these are seen, the rest of the dung must be made up into a bed for one or more lights. This must be three feet thick, beat close together, and covered three inches deep with fine fresh earth; the frame must then be put on, and covered at night, or in bad weather, with mats. When the earth is hot enough, the young plants from under the bell must be removed into it, and set at two inches distance. The glas must be now and then a little raised, to give Cucumis, air to the plants, and turned often, to prevent the wet from the steam of the dung from dropping down upon them. The plants must be watered at proper times; and the water used for this purpose must be set on the dung till it becomes as warm as the air in the frame; and as the young plants increase in bulk, they must be earthed up, which will give them great additional strength. If the bed is not hot enough, some fresh litter should be laid round its sides; and if too hot, some holes should be bored into several parts of it with a stake, which will let out the heat; and when the bed is thus brought to a proper coolness, the holes are to be stopped up again with fresh dung.

When these plants begin to float their third, or rough leaf, another bed must be prepared for them like the first; and when it is properly warm through the earth, the plants of the other bed must be taken up, and planted in this, in which there must be a hole in the middle of each plant, about a foot deep, and nine inches over, filled with light and fine fresh earth laid hollow in form of a basin; in each of these holes there must be set four plants; these must be, for two or three days, shaded from the sun, that they may take firm root; after which they must have all the sun they can, and now and then a little fresh air, as the weather will permit. When the plants are four or five inches high, they must be gently pegged down towards the earth, in directions as different from one another as may be; and the branches afterwards produced should be treated in the same manner. In a month after this the flowers will appear, and soon after the rudiments of the fruit. The glases should now be carefully covered at night; and in the daytime the whole plants should be gently sprinkled with water. These will produce fruit till about midsummer; at which time the second crop will come in to supply their place; these are to be raised in the same manner as the early crop, only they do not require so much care and trouble. This second crop should be sown in the end of March, or beginning of April. The season for sowing the cucumbers of the last crop, and for pickling, is towards the latter end of May, when the weather is settled; these are sown in holes dug to a little depth and filled up with fine earth, so as to be left in the form of a basin; eight or nine seeds being put into one hole. These will come up in five or six days; and till they are a week old, are in great danger from the sparrows. After this they require only to be kept clear of weeds, and watered now and then. There should be only five plants left at first in each hole; and when they are grown a little farther up, the worst of these is to be pulled up, that there may finally remain only four. The plants of this crop will begin to produce fruit in July.

The cucumber is taken in great cities by the lower people as nourishment; but by the better sort is chiefly used as a refrigerant, or condiment, to accompany animal food. They have a bland insipid juice, without acidity or sweetness, approaching, as appears by their ripening, to a farinaceous matter. When used green they have no nourishment, so they are only to be used in the summer season and by the sedentary. Although cucumbers are neither sweet nor acid, yet they are considerably acecent, and so produce flatulence, cholera, diarrhoea, &c. Their coldness and flatulence may be likewise in part attributed to the firmness of their texture. They have been discharged with little change from the stomach, after being detained there for 48 hours. By this means, therefore, their acidity is greatly increased. Hence oil and pepper, the condiments commonly employed, are very useful to check their fermentation. We have lately used another condiment, viz. the skin, which is bitter, and may therefore supply the place of aromatics; but should only be used when young.

Besides the above-mentioned species which are proper for the table, this genus affords also two articles for the materia medica.

1. The elaterium of the hops, is the insipidated exsudate of the juice of a kind of wild cucumber, called also the afs's cucumber, a species of balsam apple. It comes to this country from Spain and the southern parts of France, where the plant is very common. It is brought to us in small flat whitish lumps or cakes that are dry, and break easily between the fingers. It is of an acid, bitter, and nauseous taste, and has a strong offensive smell when newly made; but these, as well as its other qualities it loses after being kept some time. Elaterium is a very violent purge and vomit, and is now very seldom used. The plant is commonly called spitting cucumber, from its calling out its seeds with great violence, together with the viscid juice in which they are lodged, if touched when ripe: from this circumstance it has obtained the appellation of noli me tangere, or "touch me not."

2. The colocynthis, the colocynth, coloquintida, or bitter apple of the hops, is brought to us from Aleppo and the island of Crete. The leaves of the plant are large, placed alternate, almost round, and stand upon footstalks four inches long. The flowers are white; and are succeeded by a fruit of the gourd kind, of the size of a large apple, and which is yellow when ripe. The flaky or husky outside incloes a bitter pulp interspersed with flatish seeds. If a hole is made in one of these ripe gourds, and a glass of rum poured in, and suffered to remain 24 hours, it proves a powerful purgative. The pulp itself dried and powdered is commonly used as a purgative in this country, but is one of the most drastic and disagreeable we know. If taken in a large dose, it not only often brings away blood, but produces colics, convulsions, ulcers in the bowels, and fatal super-purgations. The most effectual corrector of these virulent qualities is to triturate it finely with sugar, or sweet almonds.