174 SATURDAY IN MY GARDEN 



good feeding will surely make themselves manifest in the size 

 of the flowers and the height to which the plants will grow. 



On this point Mr Henry Eckford, of Wem, Shropshire, who has 

 done more perhaps than any man living in improving the sweet 

 pea, gives the following advice : " Any time between November 

 and February, give the ground a good dressing of manure, cow 

 manure for preference, but failing this, use well-rotted stable 

 manure or such manure as may often be obtained in towns, from 

 the butcher's slaughterhouse. This must be dug in as deeply as 

 possible. Allow the ground to lay up rough. I recommend this 

 iii preference to the ordinary method of placing the manure in the 

 bottom of a trench and covering with an inch or two of soil, 

 because I have known so many instances where this has been done 

 by amateurs, and as soon as the young seedlings get their roots 

 down into the manure they sicken and die. If the manure 

 is spread and dug in as recommended, the plants will be per- 

 fectly safe. Do not use the sweepings of a fowl-run for sweet 

 peas, as they frequently fill the ground with minute eel worms 

 and nothing will more surely destroy the plants. Much loss is 

 traceable to this pest." 



The problem when to sow out of doors is easily solved if the 

 grower intends merely to provide a summer display in the garden. 

 In a moderately dry February, the seed may be sown during the 

 second week, but I do not think that there is much to be gained 

 by sowing out of doors at so early a period of the year. No time 

 will be lost by postponing the operation until March, and even 

 then it will be an advantage to wait until the ground is dry and 

 is in an easily workable and friable condition. 



If sweet peas are to be cultivated in rows it is a good plan to 

 draw a broad, flat-bottomed drill, about a foot or eighteen inches *>- 

 wide. On no account should it be concave. The inevitable 

 result of this would be to crush the seed into the centre of the 

 shallow drill, and to cause overcrowding. .Thin sowing, however, 

 can be carried out with perfect ease if the drill be flat. If clumps 

 are to be grown, the same rule should be observed the bottom 

 of the circular trench should be perfectly flat. 



