24 KITCHEN-GARDENING. 



vorable seasons. Some plants are retarded by cold, others 

 by excess of dry weatlier ; and at such times, seed may fail to 

 vegetate for want of pressure. In the event of drought after 

 heavy rains, seed and young plants often perish through 

 incrustation of the soil, and from other untoward circum- 

 stances, which can neither be controlled nor accounted for, 

 even by the most assiduous and precise gardener. It must, 

 however, be conceded, that failures often occur through seed 

 being deposited too deep in the ground, or left too near the 

 surface. Sometimes, for want of sufficiency of seed in a given 

 spot, solitary plants will perish, they not having sufficient 

 strength to open the pores of the earth ; and frequently inju- 

 dicious management in manuring and preparing the soil will 

 cause a failure. 



I have been induced to expatiate, and to designate, in the 

 seventh range of the preceding table^ such plants as are generally 

 cultivated first in seed-beds and afterw^ards transplanted for the 

 purpose of being accommodated with space to mature in, with 

 a view to answer at once the thousand and one questions asked 

 by inexperienced cultivators. 



QUANTITY OF SEED. 



Some persons, from ignorance of the nature and object of 

 raising plants for transplanting, ask for pounds of seed, when 

 an ounce is amply sufficient for their purpose. For example, 

 an ounce of Celery-seed will produce ten thousand plants. An 

 ounce of Cabbage-seed will produce from three to four thou- 

 sand ; sufficient, when transplanted, to cover nearly half an acre 

 of land — which land, if sown with spinach, for instance, would 

 require from four to six pounds of seed. 



TIME TO COMMENCE GARDENING. 



The following directions for the management of a garden 

 are founded on the results of practical experience in the vicinity 

 of New York City, where the soil is generally susceptible of 

 gardening operations towards the end of March. These diroc- 



