V. CABBAGE. 



as they come out of the ground. Then, with a little 

 sharp-pointed stick, replant them in this new bed at the 

 distance of three or four inches apart every way. This 

 is called pricking out. If you have more plants than you 

 want, you throw away the small ones if you want all the 

 plants that you have got, it is adviseable to divide the lot 

 into large and small, keeping each class by itself, in the 

 work of pricking out -, so that when you come to transplant 

 for the crop, your plants will be all nearly of the same 

 size ; that is to say, the large will not be mixed with the 

 small 5 and there is this further convenience, that the 

 large ones may make one plantation and the small ones 

 another. This work should be done, if possible, in dry 

 weather, and in ground which has just been fresh dug. In 

 a very short time,these plants will be big enough to go into 

 their final plantation : they will come up with stout and 

 straight stems, without any tap root, and so well furnished 

 with fibres as to make them scarcely feel the effect of 

 transplanting ; whereas, if you were to suffer them to 

 stand in the seed-bed until large enough to be trans- 

 planted, they would come up with a long and naked tap- 

 root, ungarnished with fibres, and would be much slower 

 in their progress towards perfection, and would, in the 

 end, never attain the size that they will attain by these 

 means. The next operation is, to put the plants out in a 

 situation where they are to produce their crop. They 

 are to stand in rows, of course ; and I will speak of dis- 

 tances by and by when I come to speak of the different 

 sorts of cabbages. At present I am to speak only of the 

 act of planting. The tool to be used isthat which is called 

 a setting-stick, which is the upper part of the handle of a 

 spade or shovel. The eye of the spade is the handle of the 



