188 APPENDIX. 
and ripening Ist of September. I think this last will 
prove to be a very good grape. 
But this letter has reached a great length, and I 
must close it, with all its shortcomings. If it contains 
any thing of use to you for the purposes of your man- 
ual, you are at liberty to do what you please with it. 
Sincerely yours, PETER B. MEAD. 
APPENDIX H. 
From the “American Agriculturist,” Sept., 1854. 
THE FRUIT AND VEGETABLE GARDEN. 
BY AN AMATEUR. 
THERE are few accessories of the homestead more 
important than a good fruit and vegetable garden; no 
home is perfect without them. If there is one thing 
more than another which adds to the comforts of a poor 
man’s cottage, it is a well-kept garden, in its largest 
sense; nay, it is a luxury, even to the millionaire. A 
well-regulated house within, and a well-kept garden 
without, make up much of the sum of human happi- 
ness. How few such there are! The garden is too 
generally looked upon as something to minister to the 
mere appetite; but, when rightly regarded, it exercises 
a moral and intellectual influence which gives it a 
strong claim to the serious consideration of all who feel 
any concern in the ultimate destiny of the human race. 
Horticultural pursuits, above all others, bring into 
healthy play those powers of body and mind, the mu- 
tual exercise of which alone can keep up that just 
equilibrium of the physical, intellectual, and moral 
forces, which makes the true man. 
