14 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



selected for seed be uninjured, for the sprout that issues from 

 the centre is the only one that produces the best seed. 



The seed from a turnip or a ruta-baga that has had the top 

 cut close, causing thereby the sprouts to issue from the sides, 

 will not produce good roots, but generally tops, with only a tap- 

 root of no value. But turnips designed for late keeping should 

 have the tops pared close, and the tap-root cut off to prevent 

 sprouting, which causes a turnip to become corky. Cabbage 

 seed should never be grown from stumps, but from a sprout is- 

 suing from the centre of a perfectly developed head. A medium 

 crop of vegetables, the result of three or four cords of manure 

 per acre, may pay expenses ; but it is the large crops, requiring 

 from seven to twelve cords of well-rotted or composted manure 

 per acre, with clean culture, that afford the profit. Green 

 manure is wholly unfit for the culture of vegetables. 



To illustrate the importance of high culture and thorough- 

 bred seed, I will mention an instance that has come under my 

 notice the present season. Mr. David Wentzell, of Salem, has 

 two acres of onions, to which he applied fifteen cords of muscle 

 mud, of the first quality, and twenty-five cords of well-rotted 

 stable manure, measured as thrown lightly into the cart without 

 treading, and probably equal to eighteen cords trodden. He 

 sowed the very best quality of known thoroughbred seed on an 

 acre and three-quarters, then sowed seed grown by a neighbor, 

 of as good quality as the average used ; not having quite enough, 

 he bought more at a seed store to finish the field. All came up 

 equally well. On the part sown with thoroughbred seed there 

 is scarcely an imperfect onion, and the crop is the largest in the 

 vicinity. On the part sown with good seed, the onions are ten 

 days later, of inferior quality and less quantity, and valued at 

 twenty-five per cent, less than the first. On the part sown with 

 seed from the store, (which probably was of about the quality 

 usually in the market,) the onions were still later, of much 

 worse quality and less quantity, and valued at fifty per cent, 

 less than the first. Any one, walking across the field, could 

 tell at a glance and to a row where the different qualities of 

 seed were sown. 



Here, then, is an instance where a field of onions, under very 

 high cultivation, was treated, every part, exactly alike, except 

 in the quality of seed sown. The thoroughbred seed yielded 



