12 FORMATION OF KITCHEN GARDEN 



being from east to west, so that the greater portion of the 

 land may have a southern exposure. If at all possible, 

 the kitchen garden should be surrounded by walls. 

 It must have an enclosure of some description, and al- 

 though walls are expensive to build, they will, if properly 

 managed, in time amply repay the expenditure. They 

 are valuable as shelter to the vegetables, and provide 

 a surface against which can be grown a great variety 

 of hardy fruit trees ; indeed it is only against walls 

 that several of our choicest fruits can be grown out- 

 of-doors in this country, and the farther north one 

 goes the more necessary walls become. Hardy fruit 

 and vegetable culture are inseparable, and can be 

 economically carried out together, so that the planting 

 of a hedge around a kitchen garden to afford protection 

 to the crops within, instead of a wall, is false economy. 

 The walls around some of the best kitchen gardens 

 in the country are 12 feet high and ij- feet through, 

 but in smaller gardens such are unnecessary. To 

 be of real value, however, they should not be less 

 than seven or eight feet high. Adequate protection 

 must be given to fruit trees against the exterior of 

 the garden wall, and this cannot be better provided 

 than by planting a hedge of Thorn or Holly say at 

 a distance of about eight yards. If it is necessary 

 specially to protect the garden, a good way of doing 

 so is to make a deep ditch all round and plant the 

 hedge upon the top of the bank nearest the wall. Cob- 

 bett's English Gardener contains a note about this 

 that is worth reproducing. " You make a ditch six 



