Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XVI.djvu/30

 22 T0BINGEN while those raised in Georgia and Florida are much larger and finer than any that can be produced abroad, and their culture is rapidly extending. The old tubers produce around the base numerous offsets, which serve for propa- gation ; these are cultivated in rows, like onions, for one or two years, according to size, to make flowering bulbs, as they are called in the trade. To insure their flowering, the tubers should be stored where the temperature will not go below 50, or the undeveloped flower buds may be killed. If the dry tubers are planted in the open ground in northern locali- ties, the flowers are apt to be killed by frost, just as they are opening; to avoid this the bulbs should be put in boxes or pots of earth early in May, and placed in a greenhouse or warm window, where they will start, and then transferred to the open ground, after cold storms are over, in June. Botanists are not agreed as to the native country of the plant, some accrediting it to the East Indies and others to Mexico, but it must be treated like a native of the tropics. The flowers, both from being white and on account of their fra- grance, are in great demand for bouquets aijd floral designs, and florists resort to every means to secure a supply during the winter. For early winter flowers, the plants that have not yet bloomed in the open ground are taken up and put in the greenhouse ; and bulbs of the previous year's growth are carefully kept until August, when they are planted under glass. For forcing purposes the dwarf variety men- tioned is especially valuable; the forced plants are rarely potted, but set in a bed of earth made upon the greenhouse bench. A tuber or bulb after it has once flowered is valueless. TUBINGEN, a town of Wurtemberg, in the circle of the Schwarzwald, on the left bank of the Neckar, 18 m. S. W. of Stuttgart; pop. in 1872, 9,313. It has two new suburbs, an old StiftsUrche and several other Protestant churches, and a Roman Catholic church. The, university, founded in 1477, has been distin- guished since the 16th century in Protestant theology and in philosophy, and especially in the present century through the new Tubingen school of theology founded by F. 0. Baur. In 1876 it had seven faculties, with more than 80 professors and other teachers, nearly 900 stu- dents, and about 40 distinct institutions, inclu- ding the library in the Hohentubingen palace with 200,000 volumes and 2,000 manuscripts. ' TUCKAHOE, the aboriginal name of a curious subterraneous vegetable production, also called Indian bread and Indian loaf, found from New Jersey southward to the gulf and westward to Arkansas. It is in roundish masses, from the size of a pullet's egg to that of a cocoanut or much larger ; its brownish surface resembles that of a loaf of coarse bread, while within it is a homogeneous whitish mass, with an earthy odor, and on drying cracks and becomes hard t is usually found at planting time, when it is turned up by the plough, and presents no indi- TUCKER cations of having been attached to the roots of plants, or to a mycelium, as are most fungi. Under the supposition that it was a fungus, Clayton, and afterward Schweinitz, placed it with the puff-balls as lycoperdon aolidum, and Fries called it pachyma eocos ; but there is no reason for considering it a fungus, other than its underground manner of growth, and its somewhat distant exterior resemblance to the truffle (see TRUFFLE) ; on account of these it has been mistaken for the truffle. From the entire absence not only of reproductive organs, but of all cellular structure, and the lack of all knowledge of it in an early stage of its devel- opment, the tuckahoe has long been a puzzle to naturalists. About 30 years ago the lato Prof. John Torrey made a chemical examina- tion of it, and, while he was unable to detect by chemical tests the presence of starch, which the microscope had also failed to show, ascer- tained that the mass consisted almost entirely of pectin, which in some of its modifications is the jelly of fruits. It has been suggested by Berkeley and others that the tuckahoe is a secondary product, caused by the degeneration of the tissues of the root of some flowering plant, in which a change has occurred similar to that which converts animal tissues into adi- pocere, and that the cellulose and all other principles are transformed into a body of the pectoso group; this is a conjecture only, against the probable truth of which is the fact that no intermediate states have been found, while none, large or small, present any trace of plant structure. The name tuckahoe is said to have been applied by the Indians to several edible roots, and indicates that they used this as food ; it is employed in the southern states, boiled in milk, as a nutritious diet in diseases of the bowels, instead of arrowroot, and has been recommended in a medical work as a starchy food, while it contains no starch. TICKER, a N. E. county of West Virginia, touching Maryland on the northeast; area, about 400 sq. m. ; pop. in 1870, 1,907, of whom 27 were colored. It is drained by Cheat river, a tributary of the Monongahela. The surface is broken and mountainous. The valleys are productive. The chief productions in 1870. were 1,469 bushels of wheat, 1,294 of rye, 27,- 813 of Indian corn, 14,726 of oats, 1,843 of buckwheat, 2,083 of potatoes, 6,093 Ibs. of wool, 26,769 of butter, and 1,498 tons of hay. There were 493 horses, 687 milch cows, 1,084 other cattle, 2,608 sheep, and 1,045 swine. Capital, St. George. TUCKER, Abraham, an English metaphysician, born in London, Sept. 2, 1705, died at his seat in Surrey, Nov. 20, 1774. He was educated at Oxford. In 1727 he purchased Betchworth castle, with a large estate, near Dorking, and there devoted himself to the stndy of agricul- ure. In 1754 he published the letters which lad passed between himself and his wife, under the title "A Picture of Artless Love," and in 1755 a pamphlet against strong political feeling,