32 Dewing'' s Early Turnip Beet. 



die foot of the valley nearest the lake, where it is south-west. The 

 season has been the most unfavoi^able one known in many years — ex- 

 tremely wet and cold ; notwithstanding, the crop, mainly Isabellas and 

 Catawbas, was perfectly ripened, and all I'ipened. The vines have 

 been uniformly healthy in foliage and fruit, not a cluster of rotted fruit 

 in the whole valley. A soil containing lime in abundance, with per- 

 fect natural drainage, and an equable degree of moisture in the atmos- 

 phere, from our proximity to the lake, may account in great part for 

 this perfect immunity from disease during a season which has been 

 noted for it nearly everywhere else ; the added fact that not a vineyard- 

 ist in the valley practises summer pruning has, I think, contributed to 

 the result. Our greatest trouble now is, amidst the war of varieties 

 going on, which to plant, of which, perhaps, something another time. 



RusHViLLE, November 30, 1869. 



DEVVING'S EARLY TURNIP BEET. 



By C. N. Brackett, Newton, Mass. 



This is a new and very superior blood beet, recently introduced, and 

 bears the name of the originator, Mr. Dewing, of Chelsea, Mass. 



Like the Hatch beet, figured in the September number of this Journal, 

 it was probably obtained by selection. Owing to its many desirable 

 qualities as an early market beet, it soon became a favorite variety with 

 market gardeners about Boston, and is at the present time a leading 

 sort with them. 



Some large growers prefer the Hatch beet for their first sowing, con- 

 tending that this variety will make a beet large enough for bunching, 

 several days earlier in the season than the Dewing, if sown at the same 

 time, while they give the latter variety the preference, as the most prof- 

 itable kind to grow for winter use to sell by the barrel. 



The roots are of a fine globular shape, uniformly smooth, with a 

 long and slender tap-root. Skin dark ])urj)lish-black ; flesh deep blood- 

 red ; very fine grained, tender, and sugary. Leaves erect, of medium 

 size ; leaf-stems blood-red. We have grown this variety, and also the 

 Hatch beet, under the same circumstances, and find but little differ- 



