THE FARMER AT HOME. 77 



are many varieties, but what is called the white solid, is usually 

 esteemed the best. It is produced from seed, and one ounce of seed 

 is sufficient for a thousand plants. It requires a soil rather moist, 

 rich in vegetable mould, but not rank, from new unrotted dung. 

 Some of the New Jersey gardeners, who supply the New York mar- 

 ket, have raised each 60,000 heads in a season, which, at six cents 

 the head, the wholesale price, would amount to $3600. This shows 

 how profitable its culture may be made, small as the business may 

 appear. If it were generally understood how easily it is produced, 

 few only would neglect to raise enough for their own families. For 

 the culture of it, see Schenctis Text Book, and Buist's Family Kit- 

 chen Gardener. 



CELLAR. An important appendage to every dwelling is the 

 cellar, and great care should be taken to have this so arranged that 

 the full benefit desired from it may be obtained. The cellar should 

 be well walled with stone or brick, laid in cement ; if inclining to be 

 wet, it should be drained, so as to present a hard, smooth surface, and 

 this will be .better if covered with clean gravel. Cellars should 

 wholly exclude from frost, without being too warm, as fruit and vege- 

 tables, kept in a warm cellar, will not be as good as in one of an 

 equally dry but lower temperature. Since the commencement of the 

 cultivation of roots in this country to a considerable extent, and since 

 the making of pork from steamed apples and potatoes has succeeded 

 so well, cellars attached to barns and piggeries have become necessary, 

 and are already constructed in many cases. Cellars of this kind for 

 the reception of roots, should be made so that cart or waggon loads of 

 fruit or roots can be thrown into them at once, without the labor of 

 repeated handling. 



CHALK. Compost limestone, or carbonate of lime, passes into 

 chalk, when the particles that compose the mass are so loosely con- 

 nected as to render it friable or capable of easy division ; in its essen- 

 tial qualities it does not differ materially from unburnt lime. Chalk 

 is extensively used instead of lime for agricultural purposes in many 

 parts of England, where it abounds. In the United States there is 

 no chalk, properly so called. The immense beds of white marl, found 

 in some parts of western New York, are a near approach to it, and 

 the value of such beds as a resource for easy liming soils, will be bet- 

 ter appreciated hereafter than it now seems to be. 



CHAMOIS GOATS. The Chamois inhabits the most inaccessi- 

 ble parts of the woody regions of the great mountains of Europe. He 

 bounds over the chasms of rocks he springs from one projection to 

 another with unerring certainty he throws himself from a height 

 of twenty or even thirty yards upon the smallest ledge, where there 

 is scarcely room for his feet to plant themselves. This extraordinary 

 power of balancing the body of instantly finding the centre of 

 gravity, is a peculiarity of all the goat tribe, to which the Chamoi? 



