THE MANSE GARDEN. 145 



are commonly purchased at the spring fairs : they 

 come home yellow and pliant, having just acquired, by 

 decay, the proper tenderness and saccharine flavour 

 for the soft lip of the snail. Planted in this state, 

 they all vanish, or the field is wretched with blanks, 

 in a few days. More plants are afterwards inserted ; 

 but the ground has become hard, the season is gone, 

 and the sickly crop remains to be finished by the 

 caterpillar. This is nonsense. A pennyworth of 

 seed and less wit might save all this vexation. Sow 

 on the first of August, or earlier if your climate be 

 cold ; and two months after sowing, take up two or 

 three hundred of the best plants and dibble them 

 into a warm border, three inches asunder. Thus 

 treated, they grow short-stemmed and thick-necked, 

 with a bark which the snail can no more injure than 

 that of an oak. Early in February the fresh green 

 leaf appears, and the plant begins to gather strength 

 for its summer's work. From the middle to the end 

 of this month, when the weather is fresh arid the 

 ground dry, the plants may be taken up with the 

 ball of earth which adheres to the many fibres pushed 

 from the root in consequence of the previous trans- 

 planting, and transferred to a large open quarter duly 

 prepared for their reception. Such plants never feel 

 their removal. There is no heat to wither them/ 

 and slight frosts do not affect them. The ground, 

 having been dug before winter with a deep rough 

 furrow, mellowed with frost and swollen with rich 

 manure, may be stirred from the bottom and well 

 loosened, but not turned over, and the plants set at 

 the distance of three feet by two. 



The only objection to the advantage of retaining 



