VEGETABLES PARSLEY. 187 



ticable, with crowbars, picks, and wedges, to extract them 

 slowly from the frozen soil, and with our ordinary force, 

 a few barrels were dug that day that were quickly sold at 

 $10 per barrel. I at once secured a supply of extra labor- 

 ers, and by our efforts the next day, we sent in 40 barrels 

 that sold for $6 per barrel ; three or four days more ex- 

 hausted our supply, but the plot, of little more than half 

 an acre, brought nearly $800, which would not have sold 

 for more than $200, had not the unusual scarcity in mar- 

 ket been taken advantage of. The average market price 

 is about $1.50 per barrel, and at that rate, as a farm crop, 

 it is, in my opinion, by 50 per cent, a better paying crop 

 than Onions. It will average easily 200 barrels per acre, 

 and in our rich garden soil about 300. The expense of 

 raising I should judge to be not more than $100 per acre 

 on farm land ; in gardens about $200. The increased cost 

 in the garden being mainly in the greater value of the 

 land, for it will be remembered that the annual rent of 

 leased gardens in the vicinity of New York, and other 

 large cities, is about $75 per acre. 



A number of varieties of Parsnips are enumerated in 

 seed lists, but the distinctions, as far as I have seen, are 

 hardly worth a difference in name, and I am inclined to 

 think that the soil often determines peculiarities of variety. 

 Certain it is, that by sowing the "Hollow Crowned" on 

 heavy soil, it will be in a great measure deprived of that 

 ' distinction, while the same seed sown on light sandy soil, 

 will have this peculiarity well marked. 



