THE MANSE GARDEN. 137 



and then there is no more to learn and no forgetting 

 of what has once been so acquired. But still the 

 chance is that something which should be done in 

 March will not be thought of till April, and this 

 leads me to recommend that horticultural treatise of 

 most delectable brevity annually printed in the Edin- 

 burgh Almanac. 



Whoever remembers that an account of every 

 day must be given will see the importance of con- 

 sidering, before the day be far gone, what ought to 

 be done; and whoever acts on this principle will think 

 it no hard task to look five times in the year at the 

 Gardener's Calendar. Suppose you find in the work 

 for the month some notice of the artichoke, then, by 

 referring to this book, which is designed to be no 

 bigger than an almanac, you will find, as easily as 

 looking out the letter A of a dictionary, all that you 

 require for bringing to your table the rich pulp of 

 that delicious plant. In alluding to the dictionary 

 mode of finding what the reader wants, there is, 

 besides the conveniency of the plan, this reason for 

 its adoption, that the writer finds great difficulty in 

 settling the claims of precedence amongst the mem- 

 bers of the herbal family so numerous, and all so 

 fair -and good ; and therefore he throws the respon- 

 sibility of setting one above another on some person 

 or persons long since deceased, who arbitrarily, and 

 perhaps unwarrantably, set A before B. Wherefore, 

 to proceed with A, 



The Artichoke is a delicious and wholesome vege- 

 table, provided it be itself eaten rather than used as 

 a spoon. It is propagated by offsets from the roots ; 

 and as part of the offsets require to be cleared away 



