retty closely together in
boxes filled with rich light mould, and watered when needful. When frost
comes on, the boxes are protected by any kind of litter and haulm. As
the salad is wanted, they are removed into some place having a
moderately increased temperature, and where there is no light. Each box
affords two crops of blanched leaves, and these are reckoned fit for
cutting when about 6 in. long. Another mode of obtaining the young
leaves of this plant in winter is to sow seeds in a bed of light rich
mould, or in boxes in a heat of from 55 deg. to 60 deg., giving a gentle
watering as required. The leaves will be fit to be cut in a fortnight
after sowing, and the plants will afford a second crop.
In Belgium a variety of chicory called _Witloef_ is much preferred as a
salad to the French _Barbe de capucin_. The seeds are sown and the
plants thinned out like those of the ordinary sort. They are eventually
planted in light soil, in succession, from the end of October to
February, at the bottom of trenches a foot or more in depth, and covered
over with from 2 to 3 ft. of hot stable manure. In a month or six weeks,
according to the heat applied, the heads are fit for use and should be
cut before they reach the manure. The plants might easily be forced in
frames on a mild hot-bed, or in a mushroom-house, in the same way as
sea-kale. In Belgium the fresh roots are boiled and eaten with butter,
and throughout the Continent the roots are stored for use as salads
during winter.
See also ENDIVE (_Cichorium endivia_).
CHIDAMBARAM, or CHEDUMBRUM, a town of British India, in the South Arcot
district of Madras, 7 m. from the coast and 151 m. S. of Madras by rail.
Pop. (1901) 19,909. The pagodas at Chidambaram are the oldest in the
south of India, and portions of them are gems of art. Here is supposed
to have been the northern frontier of the ancient Chola kingdom, the
successive capitals of which were Uriyur on the Cauvery, Combaconum and
Tanjore. The principal temple is sacred to Siva, and is said to have
been rebuilt or enlarged by a leper emperor, who came south on a
pilgrimage and was cured by bathing in the temple tank; upwards of
60,000 pilgrims visit the temple every December. It contains a "hall of
a thousand pillars," one of numerous such halls in India, the exact
number of pillars in this case being 984; each is a block of solid
granite, and the roof of the principal temple is of copper-gilt. Three
hundred o
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