MAY.] MELONS. 9$5 



The temperature must be kept up, by fiie-heat, 

 (probably all this month, if the weather be not mild), 

 to about 75°, at the times of regulation, mornings 

 and evenings. Admit air so freely in sunshine, as 

 to keep it down to 8.5° or 80° ; more particularly as 

 the fruit approach to maturity, which will much en- 

 hance its flavour. 



HOT-BEDS, 



Of Melons, 



The fruit will now^ be fast approaching to matu- 

 rity, if the plants have been treated as directed in 

 the former months, and if the weather have not been 

 very adverse. * As it ripens, let the quantity of wa- 

 ter be lessened, giving as much only as wiii just sus- 

 tain the plants, and keep them in health. 



A free admission of air is now of very great im- 

 portance, for giving flavour to the fruit ; which 

 may be further enhanced by thmning out the vines, 

 and by picking off such leaves as shade it from the 

 sun. 



Melons, if allowed to remain on the plant till 

 they be of a deep yellow colour, (which many do), 

 lose much of their flavour. They should therefore 

 be cut as soon as they begin to change to a greenish 



* I formerly cut melons, for three years successively, on *he 

 ]5th, 12th, and 10th May, and never sowed before the last week 

 of January, or first of February. In 1788, when at Ramharii 

 Hall, in Norfolk, I sowed melons on the 12th March, and cue 

 ripe fruit on the 20 ch May. The kind was the Early Colder; 

 Cantelope. This shows how little is to be g.iinedj or rather, how 

 much may be lost, by earl^ forcing. 



