10 Hints on Vegetable and Fruit Farming. 



as much as from 8.9. to 12.<?. per dozen bunches, each bunch being 

 about a handful. As from 140 to 300 dozen bunches are grown 

 per acre, the proceeds sometimes are very large. The Blue 

 Colewort, Cock's Hardy Green, and the Rosette are sorts adapted 

 for this purpose, but these do not make good hearts ; and the best 

 sorts for cabbages proper, with good hearts, intended for spring 

 cutting, are the East Ham, Enfield Market, Sugarloaf, Battersea, 

 and Wheeler's Nonpareil, among others. 



Cabbage-plants are grown in seed-beds, usually in strips about 

 5 feet wide. About 10 lbs. of seed are sown per acre on these 

 beds towards the end of July, for winter planting, and the beds 

 are carefully hoed over when the young plants are up, which 

 are slightly thinned, and all the deformed plants are pulled out. 

 For cabbages the plants are put out 22 inches by 20 inches. For 

 coleworts they are set 12 inches, or 14 inches each way. One 

 acre of seed-bed will plant about 15 acres of coleworts or about 

 20 acres of cabbages. Great care must be taken in the selection 

 of seed of full germinating power and true to sort, and much 

 attention must be paid to sow the seed deeply enough, yet not too 

 deeply, in the seed-beds. In ordinary seasons cabbages will be 

 cleared off by the end of June, and might be followed by wheat ; 

 or, if another crop of vegetables were desired, the ground might 

 be prepared for autumn-sown onions ; or a crop of potatoes might 

 be obtained by putting them in as fast as the cabbages were 

 cleared off. In early seasons sometimes a capital crop is grown 

 in this way,* and in this case the land would then come in for 

 winter tares, or be ploughed up for oats or barley. If dealers 

 do not take the cabbages, they could be carted to the nearest 

 town upon waggons with springs, made expressly for the purpose, 

 which take huge loads ; or to the railway station, where the 

 cabbage can be moved into trucks, or the waggon itself taken 

 to its destination on a truck, and brought back full of manure. 

 190 dozen of cabbages can be piled upon these vans, which are 

 drawn by two powerful horses. About 1000 dozens of cabbages 

 are produced per acre on an average, and the price ranges from 

 Id. to 1.9. ^d. per dozen, and even higher occasionally. Cabbages 

 also are planted in the spring for late summer or early autumn 

 cutting. 



Onions are a most paying crop, though more risky than cab- 

 bages, being liable to mildew, and entailing more outlay for 

 labour. It is not well to crop the same field with onions more 

 than once in five years. They may be taken after spring-sown 

 cabbages, or mangolds, or carrots ; or, as is done in Essex, cucum- 



* There are quick growing kinds of potatoes, suited for this piu'pose. Among 

 these is the Red Bog, which being planted at the end of April is fit to dig iu 

 August. 



