522 AGRICULTURE. 



runners. When these touch the ground, at a certain distance 

 from the plant come roots, and from these roots a plant springs 

 up. This plant is put out early in the fall. It takes root before 

 winter, and the next year will bear a little and send out runners 

 of its own. To make a strawberry bed, plant three rows a foot 

 apart, and at eight inches apart in the rows. Keep the ground 

 clean, and the new plants coming from runners will fill up the 

 whole of the ground, and will extend the bed on the sides. Cut 

 off the runners at six inches distance from the sides, and then 

 you have a bed three feet wide, covering all the ground. This 

 is the best way, for the fruit then lodges on the stems and 

 leaves, and is not beaten into the dirt by heavy rains, which is 

 apt to be the case if the plants stand in clumps, with clear 

 ground between them. 



The Garden. If it be practicable, make a garden near to 

 running water, and especially to water that may be turned into 

 the garden. Watering with a watering-pot is seldom of much 

 use, and cannot be practised upon a large scale. It is better to 

 trust to judicious tillage, and to the dews and rains. The 

 moisture which these do not supply cannot be furnished to any 

 extent with the watering-pot. A man will raise more moisture 

 with a hoe or spade in a day, than he can pour on the earth out 

 of a watering-pot in a month. 



Soil. The plants which grow in a garden prefer the best 

 soil that can be found. The best is loam, several feet deep, 

 with a bed of limestone, sandstone, or sand below. But we 

 have to take what we find, or rather what we happen to have. 

 If we have a choice, we ought to take that which comes nearest 

 to perfection ; and, if we possibly can, we ought to reject clay 

 and gravel, not only as top soil but as a bottom soil, however 

 great their distance from the surface. Having fixed upon the 

 spot for the garden, the next thing is to prepare the ground. 

 This may be done by plowing and harrowing until the ground 

 at the top is perfectly clean ; and then, by double plowings, 

 that is to say, by going with a strong plow that turns a large 

 furrow and turns it clearly, twice in the same place, and thus 

 moving the ground to the depth of 14 or 16 inches. The ad- 

 vantage of deeply moving the ground is very great indeed. 



A Hot-bed. If it can be so arranged, it should be built 



