198 MARKET GARDENING. 



the spinach, thin it as you collect for daily use. Onion 

 sets of all kinds may now be planted. Prepare ground 

 for carrots. Earth up celery in dry weather. Tie up 

 endive. Prune fruit trees, vines, etc. Transplant all 

 hardy trees. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

 The Grass Question. 



A multitude of farmers in the corn-growing States, 

 and a still greater number in the cotton States of this 

 country, are in quest of profitable and reliable tame 

 grasses. In an agricultural sense, under the designa- 

 tion *^ grass" is included the true grasses and those other 

 forage and hay-making plants sown in connection with 

 grass, and termed artificial grasses, as Red Clover, 

 Alfalfa, Sainfoin, Trefoil, and others. 



It may be stated, in a general way, that the capacity 

 of land to grow desirable grasses is the measure of its 

 agricultural value, and the extent and success in the 

 practice of growing grass indicates the degree of advance- 

 ment of a farmer in the scale of merit. Without grass, 

 although he may produce some poor stringy beef, he 

 cannot grow good mutton nor wool, nor will he have 

 plenty of hay. In the South, particularly, as an out- 

 growth of plenty of good hay and liberal feeding, that 

 important farm manufactory known as the barnyard 

 would be seen on a half million farms, which never knew 

 a barnyard in its practical sense, as a manufactory for 

 manure. The farm, county or State which cannot pro- 

 duce its own pasturage for spring, summer and autumn, 

 and its own hay for winter, is only half way up in the 

 agricultural scale, be its other crops ever so profitable. 



