58(J 



GLEAN IJSGS IN UEE CULTURE. 



Aug. 



be. When sleighing was good we procured 

 H pair of runners that slipped on to the wag- 

 on in place of t])e wheels, and with this ar- 

 rangement he found he could get around so 

 rapidly as to meet almost all of his custom- 

 ers before any of liis vegetables had time 

 to freeze, even with niodeiate protection. 

 When garden-stuff began to get more plen- 

 tiful I thought he would nci'd more help; 

 but he was intercsled in seeing liow long 

 he could get along without the bey, and I 

 believe he kept it up until the leceipts from 

 the wagon began to be about lifteen or twen- 

 ty dollars a day. During strawberry time, 

 however, when the receipts ran up one day 

 to a little over $32.00, he decided he needed 

 a boy to help handle the stuff. Of course, 

 he had a little more wages, as an encourage- 

 ment to take charge of the whole institu- 

 tion. I used to estimate that it required 

 about one-fourth of the value of garden- 

 stuff to get it converted into cash. During 

 this last spring, however, with tlie arrange- 

 ment I have mentioned, the exy)ense was 

 something like this: Horse and wagon half 

 a day, 70 cts.; man to go willi it half a day, 

 80 cts.; total, $1.-50. Now, if we sold $15.00 

 worth of goods during the forenoon, the 

 cost of selling was only ten per cent ; but 

 we have not been able to keep the expense 

 of selling as low as this much of the time. 



Now, in regard to getting the stuff on the 

 market when none is to be had elsewliere, so 

 we can have the monopoly: In the lattei' 

 part of' the winter we had the (mly celery 

 that was in Medina. This same ycung man 

 gave me an agreeab'e surprise by telling me 

 he could get 40 cts. a, pound for all the celery 

 Ave had left. Theie was none to be had 

 elsewhere, and we liave a few customers 

 who will pay almost any price to get such 

 delicacies in the winter time. In the same 

 Avay we got 40 cts. a jiound for our choice 

 lettuce. 1 supi)( se the friends who have 

 been through a similar experience know 

 what a pleasant feeling it is to lind you are 

 going to get enough for your product to pay 

 for all the trouble and bother, including bad 

 luck and reverses. AVhen prices are low it 

 is always well to do the best you can, and 

 try to make both ends meet. Jt certainly is 

 not very pleasant to sit down and figure up 

 that you have paid out more money in se- 

 curing a crop than you can g"t for it at mar- 

 ket prices. But we often have to meet this 

 state of affairs — at least we do now and 

 then. In such cases we ought to look over 

 the ground carefully and see whether our 

 crop may not be put away so as to be kept 



until the glut in the market is over. We 

 managed to house oiu- celery so that most of 

 it kept very nicely ; but the expense of put- 

 ting the crop away (during a snowstorm), 

 the boards required to cover the crop, and 

 the expense of banking it to keep out the 

 frost, cost so much that I felt a good deal 

 disheartened. I had not expected to get 

 over 16 or 20 cts. a pound for it : but when 

 Mr. Weed sold it tor forty cts., then came the 

 agreeable feeling that we could go to work 

 to improve on our plans another season, 

 with the assiu-ance that we need not be 

 afraid to invest some money in doing it 

 well. I do like to do any thing well that I 

 undertake. It was the same way with the 

 lettuce. I discovered that I could safely 

 make a nice little greenhouse in a good sun- 

 ny exposure, for the sole piu-pose of growing 

 lettuce alone, and nothing else. 



In regard to outdoor crops I have been 

 agreeably pleased to discover that we ]ieed 

 not be afraid to go to the expense of 

 thorough underdraining, manuring, and 

 even ridging the ground up in the way we 

 have, so as to have it dry enough to work in 

 the spring. After the last severe freeze in 

 April I decided it would be safe to at least 

 try a good many of the hardier vegetables 

 in the open ground, if 1 could get a piece of 

 ground thoroughly prepared. The trouble 

 was, it was all too wet when the frost got 

 out. The most promising piece of ground 

 was where celery had been last year, and 

 the ground was left in high ridges during 

 the winter. These ridges were mellow, and 

 would work nicely when every thing else 

 was wet and sticky. I w ent over the ground 

 with a potato-fork, and tried it every fore- 

 noon and every afternoon, to find the very 

 earliest hour when it wo;i!d do to put heavy 

 horses on to it; and, by the way, we can't 

 expect to do very much on outdoor crops by 

 spading up by hand. 1 have tried it some; 

 but a team with inii)rove(l machinery does 

 so much more, it seems as if we had better 

 wait a little, until the ground gets so that 

 horses can go on it. This celery ground had 

 been manured the summer before, so heavi- 

 ly that the celery was almost burned by the 

 quantities of stable nia'iiire piled on to it. 

 We plowed the ri-lj^cs down, harrowed it, 

 then worked in a little more of the very 

 nicest manure we ould get, and the ground 

 was ready for our crops. A storm was com- 

 ing on, and there was but little lime. This 

 season we have a grain-drill to sow our 

 seeds with instead of doing it by hand. The 

 grain-drill was brought out hastily, and a 



