Chap. II.] RuTA Baga cultuke. 51 



Time of Sowing. 



37. Our time of soicing in England is from the first 

 to the twentieth of June, though some persons sow in 

 May, Avhich is still better. This was one of the matters 

 of the most deep interest with me, when I came to 

 H^de Park. I could not begin before the month of 

 June ; for I had no ground ready. But, then, 1 began 

 with great care, on the second of June, sowing, in small 

 plots, once every tceek, till the 30th of July. In every 

 ease the seed took well and the plants grew well ; but, 

 having looked at the growth of the plots first so^vn, and 

 calculated upon the probable advancement of them, I 

 fixed upon the 26th of June for the sowing of my prin- 

 cipal crop. 



353. I was particularly anxious to know, whether this 

 country were cursed with the Turnip fly, "which is so 

 destructive in England. It is a little insect about the 

 sizeof a6erf^ert, and jumps away from all approaches 

 exactly like that insect. It abounds sometimes, in 

 quantities, so great as to eat up all the young plants, 

 on hundreds and thousands of acres, in a single day. 

 It makes its attack when the plants are in the seed-leaf; 

 and, it is so very generally prevalent, that it is always an 

 even chance, at least, that every field that is sown will 

 be thus Mholly destroyed. There is no remedy but that 

 of ploughing and sowing again; and this is frequently 

 repeated three times, and even then there is no crop. 

 Volumes upon volumes have been WTitten on the means 

 of preventing, or mitigating, this calamity ; but nothing 

 effectual has ever been discovered ; and, at last, the only 

 means oi' insuring a crop of Ruta Baga in England, is, 

 to raise the plants in small plots, sown atmaiiy different 

 times, in the same manner as cabbages are sown, and, 

 like cabbages, traiuplant them; of which mode of cul- 

 ture I shall speak by and by. It is very singular, that 

 a field sown one day, wholly escapes, while a field sown 

 the next day, is wholly destroyed. Nay, a part of the 

 same field, sown in the morning, will sometimes escape, 

 while the part, sown in the afternoon, will be destroyed ; 

 and, sometimes the afternoon sowing is the part that is 

 spared. To find a remedy for this evil has posed all the 

 D2 



-- ^ ffBRARV 

 OmVERSITY OF II 

 AT URBANA-CHA^ 



