ONION. 119 



Culture " which I wrote for the " Greenpoint (L. I.) 

 Times," with some additional remarks. 



" The high price obtained for this vegetable for several 

 years past has attracted the attention of farmers in those 

 sections where the soil and climate are adapted to its cul- 

 tivation. South of New York, as a rule, onions can not 

 be grown to any degree of perfection, direct from the seed, 

 not even in the market-gardens of New Jersey, and the 

 vicinity of New York City, and those adjacent to Phila- 

 delphia, all of which, perhaps, contain the finest garden- 

 ing soil in the United States, 



" Gardeners in the sections named, find it necessary to 

 use what are termed l sets,' which are produced by 

 sowing the seed very thick, in rather poor soil, and in mid- 

 summer ; when the tops become dry, they are taken up 

 with trowel and sieve, placed thinly in lofts to dry, and 

 upon the approach of very cold weather put in heaps and 

 covered with straw mats, straw, or hay. 



" During the fall they are overhauled, and all that aro 

 much larger than a marble are taken out and sold for 

 'pickling onions,' or sometimes are planted about the 

 first of September, becoming quite strong by winter, and 

 are sold early in spring as green onions. These larger 

 sets, or 4 rareripes,' as they are usually called, would run 

 to seed in time, so they must be disposed of before the 

 seed-stalks form. The small sets are planted as early in 

 spring as the ground can be worked. The land is kept 

 rich by being every year very highly manured. It is 

 plowed deep, finely harrowed, and smoothed, and rows 

 marked out with a drill containing seven to ten teeth, 

 set ten inches apart. The sets are placed about two 

 inches apart in the rows, pressed in with the thumb 

 and finger, and raked over with a wooden rake. Six rows 

 constitute a bed, every seventh drill being left for a path, 

 from which three rows on either side can be weeded at a 

 time. The onions from these sets arc sold mostly in 



