368 TRANSACTIONS OF THE HORTICULTURAL 



the man a spading-fork ; or, what is better, take the fork your- 

 self. If you have a piece four rods by eight, it will take a couple 

 of days to turn it up and thoroughly pulverize it. When this is 

 done, you have a seed bed from eight inches to a foot deep, every 

 particle of which is ready to furnish food for plant life. After a 

 very wet winter, or one of little frost, it pays to loosen the 

 ground below the spading. Do not sow a seed upon any part of 

 it until after it has lain a day or two exposed to the atmosphere. 

 If nature is kind enough to send you a good rain upon it before a 

 seed is put in, so much the better. Do not rush in the seed if it 

 happens to look rainy. The elements of the plant food in the 

 air, carried down by the rain, combine with those in the earth, 

 but do not spring into activity and fly away when the shower 

 ceases, and the subtle chemistry of nature takes time for its pro- 

 cesses. The seed sown after the rain is over is liable to outstrip 

 in growth and product the one which lies and soaks, and then has 

 to push its young plant through a hard crust. 



A piece of ground even smaller than this has in it room for a 

 row of raspberry bushes, three or four grape vines, and currant 

 bushes enough to supply a fair-sized family with all the "lazy- 

 man's" fruit which it needs. Do not wait a year or two to set 

 these. They grow rapidly in our soil, and if you have never 

 tried it, you will be surprised to find how soon they will supply 

 your table. 



Do not plant too large a portion of your garden for early vege- 

 tables, nor too much of any one kind of seed. It takes but a few 

 square feet to raise enough of the first crop of onions, lettuce, 

 peas or radishes, and all the surplus is a dead loss and a nuis- 

 ance. Put in few enough so that you can afford to lose them by 

 a late frost if it should come, but enough to furnish your table 

 well while they are young and tender. "A little at a time and 

 often" is a good foundation rule to follow in your garden during 

 the season. Beans and corn planted so early that they come up 

 yellow and stay so can hardly be expected to yield much of a crop 

 or to have it ready for use before that which is planted when the 

 ground has become warm and danger of frost is past. 



A little watching will show how long it takes from the planting 

 to the time when each kind of vegetable is ready for use. Make 

 a note of this and let it be your guide in putting in the three or 

 four later crops of those things of which you need a succession 

 during the summer months. Last year we had four plantings of 

 peas, no two of which lapped each other enough to allow the 

 earlier to grow hard, yet from the time the first were ready to use 

 until late in the season there was scarcely a day on which there 

 was not an abundant supply for the table. The same was true of 

 beans and corn; and the lovers of the "Native American" suc- 

 cotash and of the separate grains can guess how large a place they 

 filled in the economy of the household. 



