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in our house, and that is a great deal. And there is no expense connected with it after 

 preparing the ground with it in the first place. In speaking of lettuce there was one 

 kind not mentioned that I think should have been mentioned, that is, the French Cos 

 lettuce. I know that people generally say they cannot make it head. I think a crop of 

 onions can be carried on as profitably, perhaps more profitably, than a crop of any other 

 kind of vegetable. . I have a piece of land about seventy feet square off which I have now 

 for the past seven years averaged nearly forty bushels. That would be at the rate of 

 about 300 bushels to the acre. Now, there is no more expense in growing onions than 

 there is in growing a good crop of potatoes. These generally average me about a dollar 

 and a half a bushel. That is in the spring. The only difficulty would be in keeping 

 them safe, and I find not the slightest difiiculty in that. I have a building prepared 

 partly on purpose for that. It is a loft over my tool-house. It has a good floor, and on 

 it there is about ten wagon loads of dry dust — black muck from the swamp. I generally 

 add a load to it every year. That gets intensely dry. I spread four or five inches of it 

 on the floor on the first place, lay the onions to the depth of five or six inches, cover that 

 up with dry dust again — the balance of it, and then put on some straw. About the first 

 really cold snap that comes on I open the doors and let the onions freeze if they can. 

 When I believe they are pretty well frozen I close everything up, and never open it 

 again until the time I want to get the onions out, and I find they are in perfect condition 

 apparently. Whether this treatment hurts them or not I do not know ; all I know is I 

 can always sell them readily for a big price. I have grown onions for seven years in the 

 same piece of ground, and I find the last crop as good as the first. Last year I got 

 thirty-seven and a half bushels from that piece of ground. 



A Member. — What do you fertilize the ground with 1 



Mr. Beall. — With barnyard manure chiefly. I use ashes somewhat, and I use salt 

 very largely. On that spot I generally use half a barrel of salt a year. My barnyard 

 manure I produce in the spring of the year, and shortly afterwards I get a few loads of 

 this same black muck put on to it, and that is turned over several times during the sum- 

 mer, and not applied on the ground until I am ready to trench up for the winter. 



Mr. Page. — In reference to asparagus, I was unable to get any data as to the pro- 

 fitableness of that article. I find there was very little of it grown except in very few 

 places. My own experiences of it have not been very pleasing. I have raised onions to 

 a considerable extent, and I find the ground is better adapted to onions the third, fourth, 

 or fifth year than it is the first year, provided it is properly manured. Mr. Beall refers 

 to using muck for onions. I tried that one year, and was very successful indeed with it. 

 I mixed a little lime and ashes with it, and then the onions grew very large and thrifty, 

 but when we came to use them they were so strong that we could scarcely use them at 

 all, I do not know whether that was from the manure, or the muck, or what. The soil 

 that I raised them on was a sandy soil, which I think is the best for raising onions. 



Mr. Bucke. — Down our way it has been considered wrong to grow asparagus in 

 beds unless you plant them a long way apart. The roots of the asparagus require plenty 

 of room, and it would be better in rows than in beds. We used to grow cauliflowers 

 down our way, but the cabbage insect has proved so bad that we had to give it up of late 

 years. The most delicious vegetable, I believe, that is grown was not mentioned in INIr. 

 Page's report, that is, the Lima bean. 



Mr. Beadle. — Do you grow that at Ottawa? 



Mr. Bucke. — Yes. We generally plant it on sods, either under a cold frame or on a 

 hot bed, and then plant it in hills and grow it on poles. They do not come in until 

 about September. When we plant them in sod we transplant the sod with them. 



Mr. Beall. — We have no more tronble in growing the Lima bean than we have the 

 Early China, but I can tell you a wrinkle about the matter. I learned it by negligence 

 this last year. We like the old butter bean — that is, the tall one ; and we like the Lima 

 bean better than any other of that class. Last year I had to neglect some portion of my 

 garden. These beans were neglected among other things. They were neither of them 

 ever poled. They just grew in a perfect mass on the ground near together ; and it was 

 the best crop we ever had. 



Mr. Taylor. — We would not have the Lima bean in our garden. It is no profit to 



