eir roots, the only part which is eaten. They should be boiled
like young carrots, and they will eat very well with meat, or alone, or
in soups. The shoots of salsify in the spring, from the roots of a year
old, gathered green and tender, will eat very nice, if boiled in the
same manner as asparagus.

SLATE, a well-known, neat, convenient, and durable material, for the
covering of the roofs of buildings. There are great varieties of this
substance; and it likewise differs very greatly in its qualities and
colours. In some places it is found in thick laminae, or flakes; while in
others it is thin and light. The colours are white, brown, and blue. It
is so durable, in some cases, as to have been known to continue sound
and good for centuries. However, unless it should be brought from a
quarry of well reputed goodness, it is necessary to try its properties,
which may be done by striking the slate sharply against a large stone,
and if it produce a complete sound, it is a mark of goodness; but if in
hewing it does not shatter before the edge of the _sect_, or instrument
commonly used for that purpose, the criterion is decisive. The goodness
of slate may be farther estimated by its colour: the deep black hue is
apt to imbibe moisture, but the lighter is always the least penetrable:
the touch also may be in some degree a guide, for a good firm stone
feels somewhat hard and rough, whereas an open slate feels very smooth,
and as it were, greasy. And another method of trying the goodness of
slate, is to place the slate-stone lengthwise and perpendicularly in a
tub of water, about half a foot deep, care being taken that the upper or
unimmersed part of the slate be not accidentally wetted by the hand, or
otherwise; let it remain in this state twenty-four hours; if good and
firm stone, it will not draw water more than half an inch above the
surface of the water, and that perhaps at the edges only, those parts
having been a little loosened in the hewing; but a spongy defective
stone will draw water to the very top. There is still another mode,
held to be infallible. First, weigh two or three of the most suspected
slates, noting the weight; then immerge them in a vessel of water twelve
hours; take them out, and wipe them as clean as possible with a linen
cloth; and if they weigh more than at first, it denotes that quality of
slate which imbibes water: a drachm is allowable in a dozen pounds, and
no more. It may be noticed, that in la