

V. ASPARAGUS. 



her. The seed should be then gathered, made perfectly 

 dry. The pods kept whole and hung up in a dry place 

 for use 3 when wanted to be sown, it should be rubbed 

 out of the pod. Out of the pod, the seed will keep four 

 or five years ; but, if in the pod and kept dry, it would 

 probably keep twenty. To have asparagus beds, there 

 are two ways of going to work : first : sowing the seeds 

 in the beds at once $ and, second, raising the plants else- 

 where, and transplanting them into beds. The beds 

 ought to be four feet wide, and not more, because you 

 ought to be able to cut the asparagus without going upon 

 the beds. If the ground where the beds are to be, have 

 a dry bottom to a great depth, the beds may stand pretty 

 nearly upon a level with the common earth of the garden j 

 but, if the bottom be wet, the paths between the beds 

 ought to be deep ; they ought to serve as trenches ; for 

 asparagus does not like to have its roots sopping in wet ; 

 and yet it likes rich and rather moist ground. It is un- 

 derstood that the whole of the garden has been trenched 

 to the depth of three feet nine inches, to which depth, 

 however, the root of the asparagus will not be very long 

 in going j for, if the culture be good, and the bottom 

 free from stagnant water, a plantation will last for a good 

 long life-time, or more. The ground being manured 

 well, well-dug, and made very fine, lay out your beds in 

 March in dry weather j or, indeed, in good ground, any 

 time in April may do very well. Suppose, four beds to 

 be wanted, each of them as long as the width of one of 

 the plats in the garden. Lay out the four beds at the 

 west end, for instance, of plat g ; and the beds will, of 

 course, run from north to south : each bed is to be four 

 feet wide, and each alley between the beds, two feet, or 



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