EXPENSES. 115 



as well draw a check on a bank in which he has 

 made no deposit, as to plant seed and fruit in 

 poor ground. Yet multitudes are doing the lat- 

 ter every year and growling over the result. 

 Nature is very independent, and keeps on the 

 even tenor of her way with a sublime indifference 

 to those who disregard her laws. It should be 

 remembered also that land in very fair condi- 

 tion for farm-crops is in no state for a garden. 

 The soil must be deepened and thoroughly 

 warmed and mellowed by manure. During the 

 first year that my garden reached its present lim- 

 its, I expended not far from four hundred dol- 

 lars, in this way; and in '71 I laid out sixty- 

 eight dollars and fifty cents in maintaining the 

 necessary degree of fertility. This was not at 

 all extravagant, for Mr. Henderson (certainly an 

 indisputable authority on such subjects) states 

 that the market-gardens around New York re- 

 quire from fifty to one hundred tons of barn- 



