262 THE DAILY LIFE OF OUR FARM. 



gardener out of the crop which I had raised the year 

 before from diseased plants. Three weeks since we 

 stored our crop, a most prolific one, of mealiest roots, 

 free from all symptoms of disease. To-day and to-mor- 

 row I plant nine inches deep, or rather with nine inches 

 of soil on them, the small ones of this crop, which were 

 carried under cover and spread thinly until wanted. 

 What a saving of trouble in the spring time is it to be 

 thus forward ! A friend who tasted our potatoes last 

 year, and was informed how I grew them, was quicker 

 on the feather than myself, following implicitly my own 

 directions to replant at once the diseased tubers, as they 

 were taken up, in ground ready prepared for the pur- 

 pose. He has a capital crop, with some, but compara- 

 tively few, gaps, while the weight at the roots is con- 

 siderably greater than in the case of the spring-planted. 

 He had not finished taking the crop up when I saw him 

 last. I will report progress when I know. 



Another gentleman's gardener, who doubted my re- 

 commendation to plant the diseased tuber, still ventured 

 to put in some sound, or apparently sound, seed, as I 

 recommend, late in autumn, with nine inches of soil 

 overhead. He reports that the produce is much heavier 

 than that of the spring-planted in the same field. Here 

 again is a fact in favour of autumn planting which my 

 gardener, whom I rejoice in having converted to my 

 side, has just gleefully mentioned to me. In a plot of 

 outside garden which I allow to a man-servant, he 

 managed to leave a potato-tuber behind in the ground 

 when the crop was raised last year. 



This struck out so manfully in the spring that the 

 gardener persuaded him to let it grow on. It came up 

 between the pea rows. The only extra nursing that it 



