AMERICAN HOME GARDEK. 171 



them at least once with half a handful of plaster (gypsum) to 

 each if not used at the time of planting, and hill them grad- 

 ually, and they will soon furnish your table. 



The Mercer or " Nutmeg" may be planted for the early crop. 



The potato has of late years become subject to a disease 

 known as the " potato-rot," by which the whole crop of a farm 

 or a district perishes within a few days. As yet it remains en- 

 tirely unaccounted for, neither has any remedy for it been dis- 

 covered. 



The ground intended for Lima or other pole beans may be 

 half cropped with early potatoes by planting the latter in rows 

 four feet wide, and afterward planting the beans in their hills 

 between them. The potatoes, if well planted and tended, will 

 come off in time to give the beans the whole space, and the 

 rough manure used for the former will be reduced to a proper 

 state to feed and stimulate the latter. 



Frequent and pretty thorough experiments have been made 

 to ascertain the proper size for seed potatoes, and whether they 

 ought to be planted whole or~may advantageously be cut up, 

 but no satisfactory conclusion has been arrived at. Results 

 have been obtained from plantings of the mere eyes scooped 

 out of the size of a cherry, and even from thick peelings, near- 

 ly or quite equal to those given by plantings of large whole 

 tubers. In this dilemma, the prevailing sense of intelligent 

 cultivators seems to have fallen back upon the general princi- 

 ple that " like produces like," and to have concluded that the 

 sets ought to be at least mature, and of fair (egg) size, and 

 that, if much larger, they may be cut. The principle and the 

 practice under it are sound, especially in all vegetable life, 

 where mere habit fixes with marvelous rapidity. The results 

 which embarrassed the decision were doubtless due to the spe- 

 cial care given in the course of the experiments, and would fail 

 in any general system of culture. The rule may be safely 

 adopted to plant only mature tubers. If of egg size, or but a 

 little larger, plant them whole ; or if seed be of great import- 

 ance, divide them lengthwise or diagonally. Only one or two 

 eyes grow to top, however many the set may have. If, there- 

 fore, you have only, large potatoes, cut them into pieces con- 



