322 GARDENING FOR PKOFIT. 



the insect is harmless to the plant when in the perfect 

 state the first season, but that it is attracted by the plant, 

 deposits its eggs in the soil, and that in the larvae con- 

 dition, in which it appears the second year, it attacks the 

 root. Whether this crude theory be correct or not, I 

 will not presume to say, but if not, how can we ac- 

 count for the fact of our being able to grow this plant 

 free from its ravages every alternate year, while if we 

 attempt to do so successively without the use of lime or 

 bone dust, it is certain to be attacked ? 



4^11 authorities on gardening to which I have had access 

 seem to be unaware of the fact that club-root is never 

 seen in soils impregnated with shells. This variety of 

 soil is not common. I have never seen it anywhere ex- 

 cept here, and, as I have said, this peculiarity of location, 

 most fortunately, gives a certain clue to the facts, and 

 directly points out the remedy, which, I think, we have 

 found to be in the copious use of bone dust as manure. 



Another enemy of the Cabbage plant, and one that is 

 sometimes even more destructive than the club-root, is 

 the Cabbage Caterpillar. This insect is comparatively a 

 new-comer, having been imported from Europe by way of 

 Canada. It is produced by the small white butterfly 

 that is seen hovering over the Cabbage patches in spring. 

 It attacks the leaves of the plant, and is such a voracious 

 feeder that it will quickly destroy a whole plantation. I 

 am frequently applied to for a remedy for this pest and 

 others attacking Cabbages ; the best I know of are given 

 in the chapters on "Cabbage Culture." Nothing is 

 more difficult and unsatisfactory than the attempt to- 

 defeat the ravages of insects in the open field, and I have 

 yet to know of any being continuously successful, unless 

 perhaps, the application of Pans Green for the destruction 

 of the Potato Bug. In the long-cultivated gardens of New 

 Jersey and Long Island we do not suffer much from the 

 ravages of either of the above pests. The soil is so re~ 



