STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 73 



else, if I could possibly get a good one; the best, in this case, as in all 

 others, is the cheapest. Here is where a great many fail in having a good 

 garden. 



No one need expect to succeed in market gardening unless he has 

 some knowledge, and the more the better, of the business, and is not afraid 

 of hard labor and a good deal of dirty work, and plenty of good cheer, 

 for the market gardener well knows it is not all sunshine. It also requires 

 a great deal of skill to properly market your produce to obtain the best 

 results. A man may be capable of producing large and excellent crops, 

 but may utterly fail in marketing them. They must be put up in nice, 

 clea7i bunches, or packages, as the case may require, of even quality. I 

 find I can get as much, or more, after the poorer class is thrown out, as 1 

 can for the whole, and they meet with more ready sale. Everything must 

 be put in the best shape to catch the eye of the buyer. He should be well 

 posted in the markets all over the country, so as to know just what to ask 

 for his produce. You will perceive the object of the market gardener, as 

 well as in most all other callings, is to make money. No one can make 

 me believe that the gardener toils early and late, through mud and cold, 

 merely for the love of so doing. Lettuce, radishes, rhubarb and aspara- 

 gus are the first vegetables we market. The lettuce and radishes are gen- 

 erally grown between the early cabbage, as they are out of the way before 

 interfering with the cabbage. Hanson, Early Curled Simpson and Boston 

 Curled are the main varieties grown here, and are giving good satisfaction. 

 Of radishes, there is a variety raised by some of the gardeners around 

 Bloomington that are far superior to anything I have seen — mild and ten- 

 der in the hottest part of the season. I don't know the name of them, 

 and if they do, they will not tell for love or money. Long Scarlet Short- 

 top, Scarlet and White Turnip are very good. Asparagus is becoming 

 very plentiful in nearly all the markets, but with plenty of manure and 

 judicious marketing the returns are satisfactory. We ship most of ours to 

 Chicago. We cut at the surface of the ground, taking only the green, and 

 tie in bunches about three inches in diameter and from ten to twelve 

 inches long, with white twine at each end, and with a strip of white cot- 

 ton cloth half an inch wide, with my name, around the middle, and pack 

 in half and bushel boxes. 



A limited amount of rhubarb, for home market, pays very well. We 

 cover ours in the fall with a foot of coarse horse manure, and allow'it to 

 grow up through it in the spring. In this way, it is very early — from eight 

 to ten days earlier than that not covered — and it is very tender and nice. 



Early beets we start in the hot-house or hot-beds, in boxes about 

 three inches deep, filling the boxes level full with dirt or compost, sifted 

 through a quarter-inch sieve, and pressed down pretty firmly, sowing the 

 seeds in shallow drills about half an inch apart, and three inches between 

 drills, covering lightly and pressing the dirt again. After the plants have 

 •come up, if too thick, we thin to one inch apart in the row. We leave 

 them in the boxes until we want to plant in the field, by changing the 

 boxes to cold frames a week or two before planting, to harden them. It 

 ■does not require as much work to transplant into the garden as does the 



