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BRA 



THE UNIVERSAL HERBAL 



BRA 



the necks will become too line, and the fibres too few, the 

 plants acquiring a weak delicate habit, and the produce 

 though sweet, being small : sweetens therefore, and not size 

 being the quality requisite for the table, it is a good rule 

 for the gardener to raise his seed generally from transplantec 

 roots. But it is the farmer' s interest to avoid the two 

 extremes of coarseness and delicacy, which can be accom- 

 plished only by sometimes transplanting his seed-plants, 

 and sometimes letting them run up in the seed-bed: and it is 

 found by experience, that transplanting two, three, or four 

 years, and letting the plants run up in the third, fourth, 

 or fifth, will keep the stock in the desired state. The time 

 of transplanting is from Old Christmas to Old Candlemas. 

 The cleanest plants are the best, without much respect to 

 size : a piece of good ground near a habitation is most proper 

 for the purpose, because the plants can there be most 

 easily defended from the depreciations of the birds. It is 

 of great consequence to secure seed of a good sort and 

 quality, which cannot always be obtained from dealers ; 

 without care it will degenerate, and a mixed seed is too fre- 

 quently sold: such persons therefore as are curious, should 

 either raise it themselves, or have it raised by a neighbouring 

 labourer, or at least procured from those on whom they 

 can depend. The large green-topped Turnip is the most 

 productive, the sweetest, and most juicy 5 but the red or 

 purple-topped is the hardiest. Admirably as the Turnip is 

 calculated for cleaning land, and feeding cattle and sheep, 

 it is to be lamented that it is so liable' to accidents und 

 failures as not to be absolutely depended upon for these 

 purposes. It has the fly, and many other enemies of the 

 insect tribe, to contend with, in the early stage of its 

 growth ; second and third sowings, which are frequent, 

 seldom produce much more than the good spring-feed for 

 sheep ; alternate frosts and thaws rot the Turnips before 

 the season of greatest necessity arrives, or if they are not 

 absolutely rolled, beasts fatten but ill on frozen Turnips ; if, 

 on the contrary, the winter be mild, the Turnips run to flower, 

 and then the root has little substance in it. The Turnip 

 crop is precarious, principally because the farmer is obliged 

 to depart from the common course of nature in accommo- 

 dating it to his wants. Instead of putting the seed into the 

 ground in the spring months, when there would be as great 

 a certainty of a crop as of any other vegetable, he is obliged 

 to defer sowing till the hottest season of the year conies on, 

 when, unless he is so fortunate as to have a few rainy days, 

 or cloudy weather with frequent showers, he can have little 



hopes of success. The first enemy of the Turnip is thejly, 



as it is commonly called ; or, as others name it, thejlect; or, 

 as it is provincially termed, the black dolphin. It is in fact 

 a small insect of the coleopterous or beetle tribe, and is 

 named by naturalists Chrgsomela saltatoria. In hot summers 

 it abounds to an amazing degree, and may be heard in a 

 tield or garden among the leaves of Turnips, or any of the 

 Cabbage kind, making a pattering like rain from its continual 

 skipping. This mischievous insect is not more than from 

 one-tw*lfth to one-tenth of an inch in length ; it attacks the 

 plant as soon as it appears above ground, whilst in the seed- 

 leaf; but as soon as the rough leaves are put out strong, the 

 plant is supposed to be safe from this enemy, which is calcu- 

 lated to destroy an entire crop once in five or six years, besides 

 the partial damage which it does in most years. It hiis 

 however a rival in mischief, the Turnip bug, which becomes 

 a small fly, about one-twentieth of an inch long, and not 

 larger than a grain of Turnip seed. It is the same with the 

 l,liifk bug, tollter, or negro, with which beans are frequently 

 infested, in some places termed smother /y. The bugs, or 



fly in a larva state, frequently cover the under sides of the 

 seed-leaves, and are of different colours, yellow, green, and 

 black. When the seedling plants are infested with them, 

 they make no progress, nor any visible effort to get into 

 rough leaf ; fifty of these vermin have been counted under 

 one pair of seed-leaves, sucking the juices through their long 

 probosces. The smallest of the flies, or aphides, are of a 

 cream colour, the next green, the next to these reddish-green, 

 and the largest black. The destruction, however, which is 

 imputed to the fly, or (to speak more properly) to the Turnip- 

 beetle, sometimes seems to originate in the season. When the 

 soil is fully and permanently moistened by a steeping rain, 

 the seed will vegetate, the plants will push into rough leaf, 

 and rise without a check, though the beetle and their other 

 insect enemies be in full force : but if the Turnips have only 

 showers to depend upon in hot dry weather, the seed will vege- 

 tate, but by the time the seed-leaves are formed, the moisture 

 is wholly drawn off by the intervening days of drought ; and- 

 the plants, deprived of nourishment, pass away, parched up 

 as in an oven. The injury, however, which is done by the 

 fly being confessedly great, many remedies have been pro- 

 posed for it, although it is much to be feared that they are 

 by no means effectual. Some good, it is said, may be done 

 by running a light roller over the crop, with a bundle of 

 Blackthorn fastened behind it. Branches of elder are recom- 

 mended to be drawn over the Turnips in the same manner ; 

 and the seed is directed to be soaked in the juice of the 

 bruised leaves. But these are palliatives at best, and have 

 been found to be utterly ineffectual. Some recommend 

 the land to be fumigated, by burning heaps of quick, und 

 other weeds, to windward, when it is ready for sowing, and 

 after the seed is come up ; whilst others prescribe u steep 

 for the seed, of train or other oil, in which it is to be 

 immersed twenty-four hours or more : when the seed is 

 drained from the oil, it is to be mixed with good earth finely 

 sifted, and sown immediately ; when the plants begin to 

 appear, the ground is to be sown with soot, from eight to 

 sixteen bushels the acre. Soot is very generally recom- 

 mended as a specific against the fly ; so also is tobacco dust, 

 jut this can be applied only in small crops, such as are 

 jrown in gardens. We are told to shake the seed in a bottle 

 with flower of brimstone, and to sow them together ; or to steep 

 it in water strongly impregnated with brimstone or horse- 

 aloes. A much more likely way than any of these to secure a 

 jood plant of Turnips, is, after having made the land clean and 

 ine, as soonas the weatherwill permit, to sowtwo, three, and 

 even four pints of seed upon an acre, in suspicious seasons : 

 hus having a sufficient quantity of plants for the fly and the 

 :rop. In case the fly does not take them, it may be said 

 ;hat the plants will be so thick that they cannot easily be 

 hoed ; they may however be made fit for the hoe by har- 

 rowing them first ; and, at any rate, it is a less evil to have 

 too much work for the hoe, than little or no crop. Another 

 method of securing a crop, is sowing seed that will germinate 

 it different times. This may be done by mixing new and 

 Id seed together, and by soaking half of each in water, or the 

 trainings of a dunghill, for half an hour, and then spreading 

 t on a Hoor until it is dry enough for sowing. Thus there 

 vill be four chances for a crop, as the seed thus mixed and 

 irepared will come up at four different times. Or, sow 

 mmediately after the plough without harrowing, and then 

 he seed, lying at different depths, will come up at several 

 imes, and consequently have several chances of escaping the 

 ly or Turnip-beetle. It is very sensibly remarked by Mr. 

 Miller, that whatever will add vigour to the young plants 

 .vill prevent their being destroyed by the fly, for these never 



