give are vague and full of
exceptions: they are, that a great many wholesome plants are found among
the Cruciferae, or those whose petals are arranged like a Maltese cross,
and that many poisonous ones are found amongst the Umbelliferae.

Nettle and Fern.--There are two moderately nutritious plants--nettle and
fern--that are found wild in very many countries: and, therefore, the
following extract from Messrs. Hue and Gabet's 'Travels in Thibet' may be
of service:--"When the young stems of ferns are gathered, quite tender,
before they are covered with down, and while the first leaves are bent
and rolled up in themselves, you have only to boil them in pure water to
realise a dish of delicious asparagus. We would also recommend the
nettle, which, in our opinion, might be made an advantageous substitute
for spinach; indeed more than once we proved this by our own experience.
The nettle should be gathered quite young, when the leaves are perfectly
tender. The plant should be pulled up whole, with a portion of the root.
In order to preserve your hands from the sharp biting liquid which issues
from the points, you should wrap them in linen of close texture. When
once the nettle is boiled, it is perfectly innocuous; and this vegetable,
so rough in its exterior, becomes a very delicate dish. We were able to
enjoy this delightful variety of esculents for more than a month. Then
the little tubercles of the fern became hollow and horny, and the stems
themselves grew as hard as wood while the nettle, armed with a long white
beard, p 203 presented only a menacing and awful aspect." The roots of
many kinds of ferns, perhaps of all of them, are edible. Our poor in
England will eat neither fern nor nettle: they say the first is
innutritious, and the second acrid. I like them both.

Seaweed.--Several kinds of seaweed, such as Laver and Irish moss, are
eatable.

Cooking Utensils.--Cookery books.--A book on cooking is of no use at all
in the rougher kinds of travel, for all its recipes consist of phrases
such as "Take a pound of so-and-so, half a pound of something else, a
pinch of this, and a handful of that." Now in the bush a man has probably
none of these things--he certainly has not all of them--and, therefore,
the recipe is worthless.

Pots and Kettles.--Cooking apparatus of any degree of complexity, and of
very portable shapes, can be bought at all military outfitters'; but for
the bush, and travelling roughly, nothing is better