308 THE GARDENER. [July 



•contemporary tells us, among other tilings, Low to produce crops of 

 Peas, by simply using seeds of unimpaired vitality. Quoting the same 

 authority — Loudon — he tells us that if we wish Peas of an earlier type, 

 all we have to do is to take Peas for seed which had not been quite 

 matured. The observation which led to such advice was surely of the 

 shallowest description. That immature Peas used for seed really do 

 produce a somewhat earlier crop we know to be true, but to say that an 

 earlier type can be thus produced is wholly incorrect. An early tend- 

 ency thus produced is not permanent, but a merely accidental circum- 

 stance, and wholly on account of an impaired vitality. Impair the 

 vitality of the plants to an equal extent in other ways by sowing in 

 thin, hot, or poor soils, or by transplanting and so injuring the roots, 

 and the result will be quite the same, — the enhanced earliness being 

 produced wholly in consequence of the altered circumstances, and not 

 because of an inherent quality in the seeds. 



Another case which we have carefully proved, and which has more 

 than once proved itself, much to our chagrin, has been in the case of 

 Leeks sown in heat about the first of February, to be grown on for 

 exhibition purposes in August and September. Whenever the seeds 

 have been a little inferior, either from age or imperfect maturation, we 

 have always found that the produce of such seeds was inferior to the 

 produce of plump, well-ripened seeds ; and not only so, but a large 

 percentage of those produced from the inferior seeds ran to seed by 

 August, while with first-rate seed we have found it quite safe to sow as 

 early as the middle of January. 



Numerous other instances might be cited to show that many failures 

 arise from seeds with impaired vitality. Some years ago Mr Simpson 

 raised the question, Why the earliest crops of Turnips sometimes ran 

 straight to flower from the seed-leaf, when under what one would con- 

 sider fair circumstances ; and sometimes, under less favourable circum- 

 stances, a fair crop was secured before the spindling for seed com- 

 menced? No one answered the question thus raised. Probably the 

 experience of cultivators was identical to the querist's, and as little 

 able to "tell the reason why" as he. Since that time we have never 

 seen a sowing of these "bolt" prematurely v/ithout considering the 

 circumstances under which they had been grown, with a view to 

 discover the cause; and as showing the truth of what we have 

 written above, we recall two different sets of circumstances under 

 which part of the crop bolted and the other did not. The first 

 happened some time ago. In digging over some ground which had 

 been dug and half of it manured the previous autumn, we gave 

 the whole a good dressing of well -decayed manure, not knowing 

 that one-half had been dressed before. On this ground our earliest 

 Turnips were sown. Those on the twice-manured portion perfected a 

 very fine crop : those on the once-manured nearly all ran to seed with- 

 out bulbing at all. Since then we have taken care to have the ground 



