78 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



collar when it is never so small the lower part will be woody and tough and 

 we shall have to cut it at a proportionately greater distance from the collar, 

 as the shoot elongates, to avoid this woody portion; so that, if we plant 

 shallow and cut much below the surface, we shall always have woody butts, 

 and to avoid them we cut above ground and have green and tender shoots. 

 If, however, we plant deeply or, better still, follow the French method 

 and plant shallow and thin, during the cutting season, banking up over the 

 plants with light, friable soil, or other suitable blanching material, we 

 may have long, perfectly blanched shoots but far enough from the collar 

 to ensure tender blanched asparagus without woody butts. The secret is, 

 cut your shoots at a distance from the roots proportionate to their age. 



BEANS. 



I will only sjjeak of them as used for snaps. Since the general introduc- 

 tion of the wax-podded sorts, people have come to judge of this vegetable 

 almost entirely by its appearance, the longest, whitest, handsomest pods 

 being considered the best; but a better observation will show one that the 

 whitest pods in the basket are by no means the whitest when cooked. If 

 we will cook the clear white pods of the Ivory Pod and the yellow ones of 

 the Golden Wax, we will find the latter much the lighter and brighter 

 color; and if we go further and taste them there will be no doubt as to 

 which is the better quality. The value of a snap bean rests in its fleshy 

 pod, and in judging of the merits of different lots we should not only look 

 at the external shape and color, but at the flesh. This should completely 

 fill the pod so that there is little depression between the beans, and on 

 cutting the pod at these points there should be no cavity seen. The flesh, 

 too, should be firm and solid. In some sorts it is very juicy, and even 

 watery, when the pod is young, but speedily becomes spongy or pithy. 

 Last, but by no means least, the pod should be, as the Europeans say, 

 "free from parchment " — that' is, the inner lining of the pod should be 

 thin and without fiber, a point which is often overlooked, the observer 

 being satisfied if there is no " string " at the back. 



BEETS. 



Most people are content if the root is smooth, shapely, and of good 

 color, but this is by no means all. The color should be one that will hold 

 while cooking — should be "fast;" and second, the top should be small and 

 compact, covering and occupying as small a proportion of the top as possible, 

 because it will always be found that the portion just below the top is 

 harder, rank-flavored, and lacking in sugar. This is so universally invari- 

 ably true that the French and German sugarmakers always cut off and 

 throw away this portion, often amounting from three to five per cent, of 

 the root, saying they can not make good sugar when this part is taken. 



CABBAGE. 



In a long and large-stemmed plant we will find the leaves relatively far 

 apart and with large, coarse midribs; and as a portion of the stem extends 

 up into and becomes the objectionable core of the head, it carries with it 

 the same character, and we have a large-cored and soft-hearted head, the 

 base of the leaves being separated in the head in the same way as below it. 



