"'Chap. II. RUTA BAGA CULTURE. 75 



vegetate more quickly and more vigorously than 

 seed which has been sometime threshed out. But, 

 turnip seed will do very well, if threshed out as 

 soon as ripe, and kept in a dry place ^ and not too 

 much exposed to the air. A bag, hung up in a dry 

 room is the depository that I use. But, before be- 

 ing threshed out, the seed should be quite ripe, 

 and, if cut off, or pulled up, which latter is the best 

 way, before the pods are quite dead, the whole 

 should be suffered to lie in the sun 'till the pods 

 are perfectly dead, in order that the seed may im- 

 bibe its full nourishment and come to complete per- 

 fection ; otherwise the seed will tcither, much of 

 it will not grow at all, and that which does grow 

 will produce plants far inferior to those proceeding 

 from well ripened seed. 



Time of SoTiDing. 



37. Our time of sowing in England is from the 

 first to the twentieth of June, though some persons 

 sow in May, which is still better. This was one of 

 the matters of the most deep interest with me, 

 when I came to Hyde Park. 1 could not begin be- 

 fore the month of June : for I had no ground 

 ready. But, then, 1 began with great care, on the 

 2d of June, sowing, in small plots, once e-cery x/oeeh, 

 'till the 30lh of July. In every case the seed took 

 well and the plants grew well ; but, having looked 

 at the growth of the plots, first sown, and calculated 

 upon the probable advancement of them, I fixed 

 iipon the 26th of June for the sowing of my princi- 

 pal crop. 



38. I was particularly anxious to know, whether 

 this country were cursed with the Turnip Fly, which 

 is so destructive in England. It is a little insect 

 about the size of a hed-Jlea, and jumps away from 



