MONTHLY CALENDAR. 3G3 



ceed : — Sow the seeds in pots in veiy ricli light mould in March or April, and 

 place them in a cucumber- frame, or other gentle heat. When the second leaf 

 appears, re-pot the plants either singly or at most two or three together, keep- 

 ing them near the glass and well watered. In May remove them to a cold- 

 frame for the purpose of hardening them before they are planted out, which 

 should be done as soon as the fear of spring frosts is over, and the earlier the 

 better. The best situation for tomato-plants is against a south wall, fully 

 exposed to the sun. The plants should be well watered with liquid manure 

 to keep up a rapid growth. As soon as the blossom-buds appear, watering 

 should cease. Stop the shoots by nipping off the tops, and throw out all 

 those sprays that show little signs of fruit, exposing the young fruit as much 

 as possible to the sun and air, only watering to prevent a check in case of very 

 severe drought, of which the state of the i^lant will be the best index. In a 

 very dull, wet, cold autumn, even with the greatest care, the fruit will some- 

 times not ripen as it ought ; but in this case it may frequently be made fit for 

 use by cutting off the branches on which full-grown fruit is found, and hanging 

 them in a warm dry greenhouse or elsewhere, to soften and ripen : a cool oven 

 may be used advantageously to effect this. 



1040. Scarlet Runners. — Scarlet runners may be planted at any time in 

 April or Ma5\ The seed should be dropped about four inches apart, and if a 

 line be selected along the two sides of a walk in the kitchen-garden, a very 

 pretty shady avenue may be made. Plant stakes seven or eight feet high in 

 the row where the beans are; set two or three stakes to the yard, and bend 

 them over at the top to form arches. In the spaces between the stakes place 

 pea-sticks, to which the runners may at first be trained. The stakes should 

 also be tied together by wands arranged longitudinally, one along the top, and 

 one halfway up each side. When this framework becomes covered with 

 scarlet runners, a very pleasant shady walk vrill be formed. With a little care 

 in manui-ing and watering, the runners may be kept green and in bearing till 

 killed by the autumn frosts. The runners will blossom and bear much more 

 freely if the old beans are all removed, and they are not allowed to ripen seed. 

 A mixture of the white Dutch runner with the scarlet runner gives to the 

 avenue a very pretty effect. 



§ 4.— The Pea. 



1041. Pisum sativuTii of Linn^us is too well known to require any descrip- 

 tion ; its origin is lost in its antiquity, for Pliny only alludes to it as being 

 known to the Greeks, while two kinds, he tells us, are grown in Egypt, — one 

 round and black, the other having a peculiar shape " all its own." These two 

 sorts, which are probably the field pea and the garden pea, have multiplied 

 until the list of the nurseryman numbers the varieties by hundreds. It is dis- 

 tinguished in botanical language by its three pair of ovate leaves, entire, 

 vmdulating at the edge, and marginatc, carried on a common cylindrical 

 petiole ; its great oval stipula nearly heart-shaped, marginal, and its flowers, 



