SEASON FOR [Chap. 



colour that it assumes the second day after it has 

 suffered from the frost. It remains in this yellow 

 state till there comes a warm night, and then it 

 goes back again to its colour of bright green. 

 But, these frosts repeated upon it, give it a great 

 check, from which it does not very soon recover ; 

 so that the Americans endeavour to hit tlie pre- 

 cise time to get the plants up as early as that 

 can be done without running the risk of a check 

 which shall more than counterbalance the earli- 

 ness of the germination. This point of time is, 

 with them, from the 10th to the 20th of May. 



48. I, having this season so long fixed in my 

 mind, chose it for the planting of my corn this year; 

 but I am convinced that I was too late. We have, 

 indeed, sharp frosts sometimes in May ; and I, since 

 I have lived at Kensington, have had all my kidney- 

 beans completely cut off, and my strawberry blos- 

 soms rendered fruitless, by a frost in June. This, 

 however, is not the case one year out of ten, at 

 the most ; and even a frost like this, would not 

 kill plants of Indian Corn. It might greatly check 

 them : it might even make the tips of the blades 

 turn brown ; but the plants would speedily re- 

 cover, especially if well treated, from the effects 

 of any of our frosts in May or June, which are by 

 110 means so sharp as those which they have in 

 Long Island at that season of the year. I 

 would, therefore, and will, plant my corn between 



