202 GARDEN AND FARM TOPICS. 



another, and one far more important, is that, if the grower 

 is near enough to the city to make two or three trips a 

 day, in such a fluctuating market as that of New York, it 

 is greatly to his advantage. I have frequently seen that 

 nearly double value could be obtained for products within 

 twenty-four hours. I remember, on one occasion, when 

 engaged in business in Jersey City, where we were within 

 half an hour's time of the great wholesale Washington 

 Market of New York, one Saturday, that each of our four 

 wagons made three trips, taking in twelve loads of Cab- 

 bages, which averaged $50 per load; while on the Monday 

 following the same loads only brought us $30 per load. 

 Had we been ten or twelve miles distant from the mar- 

 ket, as the greater number of those engaged in the busi- 

 ness are, the high rates ruling that day could not have 

 been taken advantage of. I am inclined to believe that, 

 whatever kind of horticultural product is grown, whether 

 fruit, flowers, or vegetables, he that is nearest market, 

 other things being equal, has a decided advantage; so 

 much so that, in most cases, a man had better pay $50 or 

 even $100 per acre rent, if within one or two miles from 

 the market of a large city, than to get land ten or twelve 

 miles away for nothing. 



I have little to relate that is new in methods of culture, 

 in the open ground, in market gardening. Nearly the 

 same processes are now practised as when I first wrote 

 my work on this subject in 1866; but since that time we 

 have made many important improvements in culture un- 

 der glacs, particularly in the methods in use in starting 

 plants of Cabbage, Cauliflower, and Lettuce. The old 

 plan of sowing the seeds for these plants in the open air 

 in September, and pricking them off in October, and 

 keeping them in cold frames, is gradually giving way to 

 sowing in green-houses or hot-beds in February, and 



