A METHOD OF. OBTAINING VERY EARLY CROPS OF GREEN PEAS. 313 



they are about four or five inches high. I have also raised my plants in 

 semi-cylindrical tiles, such as are usually employed in draining ground, and 

 by previously depositing a little straw or litter longitudinally upon the 

 bottoms of these, I have been enabled to slide out the plants into the 

 appointed rows, without at all injuring or disturbing their roots. But 

 1 have ascertained, in the present spring, that I can obtain, by the fol- 

 lowing means, an abundant crop of peas at a much earlier period than I 

 formerly thought possible, and at little expense or trouble. 



Having found it impracticable to raise melons worth bringing to table 

 before the days become long, and light abundant, I never plant my melon- 

 seeds till the end of February, nor put the plants into the beds or pots in 

 which they are to remain to bear fruit, till the end of March or 

 beginning of April. The frames and lights were consequently out of 

 employment in January and February in the present spring ; and I had 

 also a heap of oak-leaves unemployed, which had been collected for the 

 purpose of making hot-beds, and to which use they have subsequently 

 been applied in March. With those a hot-bed was made in the middle 

 of January, into which pots of about nine inches diameter were placed, 

 at the distance of one foot from centre to centre. In each of these pots 

 a couple of dozen peas were put in a circular row ; and around them was 

 planted a row of numerous slender twigs, one foot above the surface of 

 the mould. Thus circumstanced, the peas grew very freely, and soon 

 attached themselves by means of their tendrils firmly to their supports ; 

 and in the middle of March they had become fourteen inches high, and 

 nearly in contact with the glass roof, which had been previously raised a 

 little. They were then transferred to the open border, and some manure 

 was given, and very numerous sticks were employed to afford them some 

 degree of protection. This transplantation and removal from the pots did 

 not appear to injure them in any degree ; and in the end of March many of 

 their blossoms were so far advanced that they had shed their pollen. On 

 the second day of April a frost of almost unprecedented severity 

 occurred, having been preceded by an incessant fall of snow of forty 

 hours' duration; and I anticipated the total destruction of my crop of peas. 

 I was, however, very agreeably disappointed in finding that little or no 

 greater injury had been sustained by plants of sixteen than by those of 

 four inches high : and on the 26th of April, when I last saw them, they 

 were at least three weeks earlier than any I had ever previously been 

 able to raise ; and that, in a high and cold situation, some of the pods 

 were above an inch and a half long. 



An interval of nine inches was left between each pot of plants, which 



