V. ASPARAGUS. 



plants at a foot apart in these rows> placing their crowns 

 about half an inch below the top of the ground, and then 

 covering the beds over an inch or two deep with good 

 compost, or fine manure of some sort or other, having 

 amongst it some salt, not too much, or a pretty good 

 portion of wood-ashes. You then proceed with these 

 beds, autumn and spring, precisely in the same way with 

 the beds of sown asparagus ; and you may, perhaps, 

 have them fit to cut a year earlier ; and, if great care be 

 taken, that will certainly be the case. The asparagus is 

 so excellent a plant ; it is so good, and is so great a 

 favourite, that it is one of the few garden plants that is 

 worth the trouble and expense of a hot-bed, and particu- 

 larly as the trouble which it gives is in an inverse propor- 

 tion to its value. To have asparagus in hot-beds, which 

 you may have if you will, from November until the time 

 that it comes in the open ground, this is the method ; 

 make a bed, according to the rules laid down in Chap- 

 ter III. The bed ought to be strong or weak ; that is to 

 say, high or low, according to the season of the year. In 

 November, for instance, you want but little heat : in 

 January and February a great deal : less in March, and 

 scarcely any in April. To have the plants, make a bed, 

 the rows on which should be seven inches apart, and the 

 plants six inches apart in the row. Fill this bed with 

 plants that have stood one year elsewhere in the manner 

 before-mentioned. Let them stand two years in this 

 bed, and be managed there just in the same manner as if 

 they were going to stand there for ever. At the end of these 

 two years, as soon as the haulm turns yellow, the plants 

 will be fit to take up to put into hot-beds. When you 

 have made your bed, and the heat be sufficiently up, put 



