Broad Bean 



from the north. The distance must depend upon the sorts, but two 

 feet will answer generally as the distance between the double rows, 

 and the two lines forming the double rows may be nine inches apart, 

 and the seed two inches deep. On strong ground a distance of three 

 feet may be allowed between the double rows, but it is not well to 

 give overmuch space, because the plants protect each other somewhat, 

 and earliness^of production is the matter of chief moment. It is 

 good practice to prepare a nice piece of ground sloping to the south, 

 and on this to make a plantation in February of plants carefully 

 lifted from the seed rows, wherever they can be spared as proper 

 thinnings. These should be put in double rows, three feet apart. If 

 transplanted with care they will receive but a slight check, and will 

 give a successional supply. 



Another sowing may be made towards the end of January, but 

 for the main crop wait until February or March. A strong soil is 

 suitable, and generally speaking a heavy crop of Beans may be taken 

 from a well-managed clay. But any deep cool soil will answer, and 

 where there is a regular demand for Beans the cultivator may be 

 advised to grow both Longpods and Windsors the first for earliness 

 and bulk, the second for quality. There are now at command some 

 remarkable varieties of the Longpod class adapted for exhibition, 

 and these are certainly of fair table quality, though they do not 

 possess the flavour of the Windsor section. The double rows of 

 main-crop Beans should be fully three feet apart, and the plants quite 

 nine inches apart in the rows. The preparation of the seed-bed 

 must be of a generous nature. Where grass land or land of 

 questionable quality is broken up and trenched, it will be tolerably 

 safe to crop it with Beans as a first start ; and to prepare it for the 

 crop a good body of fat stable manure should be laid in between the 

 first and second spit, as this will carry the crop through, while insur- 

 ing to the subsoil that has been brought up a time of seasoning with 

 the least risk of any consequent loss. 



There is not much more to be said about growing Beans ; the 

 ground must be kept clean, and the hoe will have its work here as 

 elsewhere. The pinching out of the tops as soon as there is a fair 

 show of blossom is a good practice, whether fly is visible or not, and 

 it is also advisable to root out all plants as fast as they finish their 

 work, for if left they throw up suckers and exhaust the soil. The 

 gathering of the crop is often so carelessly performed that the supply 

 is suddenly arrested. 



In an emergency, Beans may be forwarded in pots in the 



i? c 



