216 VEGETABLE SUBSTANCES. 



the time of sowing most favourable to the respective 

 kinds, the success of the crop may, in a great mea- 

 sure, be commanded. 



The varieties of the garden peas may, therefore, be 

 divided into early and late. The former are distin- 

 guished as being more slender in the plant, and less 

 abundant in the crop, but they are more hardy, and 

 can better withstand the cold weather; while some 

 kinds admit better of being forced, and thus can be 

 produced at the earliest approach of summer, as the 

 grand vegetable luxury of the season. The late sorts 

 are more vigorous, and more productive both in the 

 number of the pods, and the size of the grain; and 

 as they come to maturity by the natural heat of the 

 season, and in a free change and circulation of the 

 air, they are more rich and saccharine. Thus it hap- 

 pens, as is the case with many other articles of human 

 food, that green peas are really of the best quality 

 when they are so cheap that they may be purchased 

 by the people generally. 



The pea goes through all the stages of its vegetation 

 in a very brief period. More than one instance is on 

 record of a crop being obtained from seed matured 

 the same season. Some Spanish dwarf peas were 

 sown in February, and the crop was reaped the first 

 week in July; some of the pods were left to mature 

 their seed, which when sufficiently ripe were again 

 committed to the earth on the same piece of ground, 

 and a second crop was reaped on the 27th of Sep- 

 tember.* 



To obtain the very earliest crops, the seeds are 

 sown in a dry soil, about the end of October; in 

 favourable situations and seasons they stand through 

 the winter, and if the spring be a forward one they 

 may be ready for gathering about the end of May. 

 They are a precarious crop, however, and do not pay 



* Fleming's British Farmer's Magazine, Nov. 1826. 



