518 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



June 15. 



Ifiast, at the extreme left of the picture you get a 

 glimpse of one of the 100 basswood- trees I plant- 

 ed along the street some ten years ago. Ernest 

 took thi picture from one of the upper windows 

 of our type-room, and these basswood branches 

 came out a little in the way. 



A word more in regard to ^upPO't ng that 

 family on a quarter of an acre ^ ou will notice 

 by the tomato-book (p. 100) that the quarter- 

 a?re contains just 24 fifty-foot beds. Now, if 

 tach one of these beds could be so managed 

 as to give a crop worth *75.00, ^ay once a yea i, 

 the receipts of our little farm would be $1800 

 But I expect to make the same bed that gave 

 that 100,000 onion-plants give us nearlyhair a 

 dozen crops in the course of the yeai. we 

 won't figure up six times $1800 just now how- 

 ever. Alas for the imperfections of tbe bbSt- 

 managed of human schemes! The whole 

 Surth-acre may possibly give f 1^00 in a year- 

 yes, may be twice that; but I presume 1 pay 

 out for labor, seeds, and manure-to teH the 

 truth, I do not know how much — piobaoiy 

 somewhere between $500 and $1000. With the 

 many other busy cares devolving upon m« be- 

 sides that plant-garden, it is impossible toi me 

 to give you accurate figures. lean give you 

 only glimpses of the possibilities in ihis line ot 

 work! and every city of 1000 inhabitants or 

 more should, in my opinion, have at least one 

 such plaut-garden. „ luti^ 



Now, before I close let me consider a little 

 the text I have put at the head of our editorial 

 page. It does not refer to onion-plaiils— at 

 least, not particularly; but, O dear friends, it 

 does refer to that group of boys who are 

 looking to me, not only for directions in regard 

 to their work, and for their pay every Saturday 

 night, but when Sunday comes they are looking 

 to me and depending upon me for something of 

 more importance. May God help me to be 

 faithful to this precious charge. The boys 

 attend school, of course, five days in a week; 

 but they are on hand almost every morning 

 between five and six. Some of them would 

 come before five if I permitted it. and they 

 work till the schoolbell rings. When school 

 closes in the afternoon their arrival is heralded 

 by pattering footsteps and boyish voices. They 

 are so glad to get outdoors alter being kept in 

 the schoolroom that their wayward feet are 

 likely to go into the mud, and may be on the 

 plants; but for the most part they work with 

 such a hearty good will that I should he asham- 

 ed of myself if I could not overlook their boyish 

 blunders and mistakes. I do not know whether 

 they know it or not; but I love them— every 

 one of them— and it really gives me pain when 

 other boys come and beg to be taken into this 

 class, to be obliged to keep refusing th.^m, day 

 after day. What pay do they get? Well, tbe 

 youngest ones get 4 cts. an hour; the most of 

 them 5. and a few of them G. France, the one 

 who bos-es, commenced just as they did. but lu' 

 has now got up to 11 cts. an hour. When 1 

 decided I could a,fford to pay him 11 cts. 1 do 

 not believe he felt any happier about it than I 



There, friends, I have found a good deal of 

 fault in some of my past writings with these 

 boys (Jod has given me for helpers; but I feel 

 rath(M- happy, at the close of Ihls talk, to think 

 that I have not found any fault at all with any- 

 body. By the way, I must add that this sort of 

 drill that these boys are getting i«, without any 



etc.; and I confess that I have greatly enjoyed the 

 work of making this unsightly spot bud and blos- 

 som; and you, dear reader, can take any hit of 

 waste ground— tliat is, providing it gets tiie sun- 

 shine—and do as much. If it is close to the higlnvay 

 it will do its own advertising: nnri if it is close lo a 

 town or city, the space will be all the more valuable. 



mistake or question, fitting them to be useful 

 and valuable members of society; and, oh it is 

 so much better to have them busy, and in love 

 with this kind of work, than to be roaming 

 about the streets and learning mischief. May 

 God help us all in the care of the boys of this 

 our native land! 



" THE NEW CAULIFLOWER CULTURE." 



Well, why not? We have had the " New On- 

 ion Culture" and "New Celery Culture;" and 

 my experience would indicate that there is more 

 money in the New Caulifiower Culture— that is, 

 for intensive gardening — than in either of the 

 others. Get good strong plants in February or 

 March, and set them in plant-beds made very 

 rich. In fact, I think our plant- bed was at 

 least one-fourth rich old stable manure, and it 

 was spaded down perhaps a foot and a hall 

 deep. Now set your plants in these beds, a fool 

 apart. The spacing-trame described on p. 42( 

 does this nicely. After the plants get to be weh 

 rooted, no other covering is needed to proteci 

 from frost than cotton cloth. 1 did not fee 

 quite sure the plants would make nice heads sc 

 close together; but they have made the verj 

 finest I ever saw. The large leaves filled th( 

 whole bed completely full, and the heads wen 

 down in among them so that they were perfect 

 ly blanched without any tying- up of the leave 

 at all. In fact, they were regular Snowbal 

 caulifiower. For the first and finest heads w( 

 got 25 cts. per lb.; but for the smaller ones, an( 

 those not quite so handsome, 15 cts., and finall; 

 we came down to 10. We marketed them al 

 through May. I have tried Wakefield cabbage 

 on the same plan, but it was not a perfect sue 

 cess. My impression is, however, that I did no 

 give them a full loot of space between eac 

 plant and its neighbor. I am going to test.th 

 matter again. Tbe advantage of crowdin 

 them so close together is, that it is but littl 

 work to cover them, and no trouble at all t 

 weed and cultivate. 



PROTECTING FROM FROST— TWO SIDES TO TH 

 MATTER. 



And speaking of protecting plants remind 

 me that, two or three times during the latte 

 part of May, our Weather Bureau admonishe 

 us that the conditions were favorable for frost! 

 At two or three difl:erent times we put on sash 

 es. and carried potato boxes and squash- boxe; 

 until I expended from three to five dollars 1 

 Covering and uncovering. Now, the questio 

 is would a light frost have done that amount c 

 daiuiige? I think there is an extreme both way 

 in LhH matter of covering stuff. Friend Gaul 

 told me of making a smudge of wet straw, t 

 shield his early potatoes. He got up at on 

 o'clock at night, and saw by his thermometf 

 that there was danger ahead. The straw ha 

 boon placed in piles the night before. He raise 

 .. .-moke and fog sufficient to envelop his whol 

 patch of potatoes, and kept up the smudge uii 

 til he happened to look overhead and found h 

 could not see any stars— that is, when he gc 

 outside of the smoke. Then he noticed a clou 

 was doing the work for him, and he went bac 

 to bed again. Our barometer told me, the nigl: 

 before, that rain was coming, so I did not cove 

 up any thing this time, and nothing was hartn 

 ed. Where plants lie in beds so a cloth shet 

 can be quickly rolled dovvn, the expense is, ( 

 course, nothing; but where you have to carr 

 bushel boxes or sap-pails, and turn them ovf 

 tomato-plants or hills of cucumbers, it is cor 

 siderable expense, liesides, if the ground hap 

 pens to be damp, as it has been for the past tw 

 weeks, there is a good deal of tramping that 

 have begun to think is almost as bad as a ligl 

 frost. 



