172 TRANSACTIONS OF THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE 



Tomatoes — Scald and remove the skin; place in the jars; reduce 

 and treat as directed for strawberries, boil from fifteen to twenty 

 minutes; fill up and cork as for other fruits. 



To preserve vegetables, it is absolutely important to take noth- 

 insr but that which is fresh from the vine or stalk. If decav or wither- 

 ing is in the least commenced, success is impossible. 



Corn — Strip from the cob; fill in the jars; add water to fill the 

 jar two-thirds; secure the cover, and boil for five hours. 



Beans and peas in like manner, boiled from two and a half to 

 four hours. 



Asparagus — Boil for thirty minutes. Usiug no sugar and cook- 

 ing in the jar we economize expense, time, and labor, having no 

 vessels to cleanse or auxiliaries to prepare. We also retain the 

 natural flavor of our fruit, and can sugar to every variety of taste 

 when required for use, as when prepared for the table in the season. 



Hops — Statistics of Culture. 

 Mr. F. W. Collins, Rochester, N. Y: "Hop culture is wnth us 

 still in its infancy, and yet the consequence which the subject is 

 destined to attain in America is sufficiently obvious, when we com- 

 pare the results already obtained here with the condition of this 

 branch of farming in other countries. Austria, with 150,000 acres 

 of hop gardens, seldom produces more than is demanded for home 

 consumption. England has 60,000 acres devoted to hop culture, 

 and yet cannot supply her own breweries. In both these countries 

 hops are considered their best paying crop. America has at pres- 

 ent only 18,000 acres devoted to this use, but if it is true that we 

 can raise as good an article of hops, and obtain as large crops as 

 Austria or England, is it not probable that hop culture is destined 

 to become, if it is not already, one of our most profitable branches 

 of farming? Ask an English hop-grower of the comparative 

 merits of hops raised in the two countries, and he will claim supe- 

 riority for the English hops, and make disparaging remarks upon 

 the rankness and strength of American hops; but, on the other 

 hand, ask the question of those whose opinion affects American 

 farmers, the brewers and factors in England, and they will uni- 

 versallysay they have found our hops richer in lupulin (the bitter 

 principle) and in resinous gum than their own: that our hops are 

 thirty per cent stronger than theirs, and as good to work up when 

 a year old as are theirs w^hen first picked. Our dry atmosphere 



