PREFACE 



THIS book is designed to be of assistance to all 

 who have to do with vegetable seeds, whether as 

 buyers or as sellers. 



When a beginner in vegetable-gardening, I was 

 painfully aware of my need of a convenient and reliable 

 planting-table, giving particular directions for the cul- 

 ture of all vegetables. I should have been saved mis- 

 takes both ludicrous and vexatious by such a book, the 

 general value of which I can best illustrate by a quota- 

 tion from the English "Book of Asparagus," by Charles 

 Ilott (the John Lane Company, publishers). The 

 author tells the following: 



"Only a few weeks ago I was in a garden where 

 there was a large bed of salsify. The owner was not 

 satisfied with the plants, and told me he had changed 

 his seedsman, because the salsify was poor and strag- 

 gling. I examined the bed, and counted eight plants to 

 the foot run. I turned to the other side of the bed, 

 where broccoli was planted, and found them a foot 

 apart from row to row and less in the rows. They were 

 about three feet high, so I said, "Your broccoli is also 

 a failure." "Yes," he said, "no more seed from Messrs. 

 So-and-so." I said, "Are vou not blaming your seeds- 

 man for your own ignorance?" He said, "Well, my 



(ix) 



