NEW ENGI.AN© FARMER. 



Published 61/ JouN B. Rcssell, at JVo. 53 .Vorth Market Street, (over the JtgricuUural ff'arehouse). — Thomas G. Pessenden, Editor. 



VOL. VI. 



BOSTOi^, FRIDAY, MAfi( H 28, 1828. 



No. 86. 



AGRICUL,TURE. 



remain. During the summer the bed stio'ild be 

 occasionally watered with dung water; and this, 

 for the purpose of encourajrinsj the growtti of the 

 plants on their first settinjroff; and as manure 

 given in this shape is more fugitive than when 

 applied in a more solid or concentrated form, it 



[Fiom llic London Quarterly Jounial.] 



EXTRACTED FDR THE ^EW ENGI.ANIl lARMER. 



CULTIVATIOiV OF SEA-KALE. 



The Crnmht marilima, or Sea-kail, is an indi 

 genous plant of this and other countries of Europe, I cannot impart rankness to the plants when they 

 and found on the sandy beach of the sea coa^t. ! irrive at that ai-e fit to be brought to the tabi 

 It has lontT been introduced into our g rdens, as The plants cannot bo forced, nor slioiild any of 

 a culinary vegetable, but it is only within the last i their shoots be cut the first winter aftsr sowing ; 

 thirty years, that it has been brought into general i but should be suffered and assisted to establish 

 use, and subjected to a mode of cultivation, very I themselves, and gain sufficient strength to yield 

 different from that which was first bestowed upon | adequate crops the succeeding years, 

 it. The principal value of this plant, is its pro- j About the month of November, in the second 



perty of early growth ; appearing at the table at 

 a time when few such things can be had. It pre- 

 cedes asparagus, for which it is no bad substitute; 

 and, as it makes a dish of itself, it gives a variety 

 to the delicacies of the table ; and if the opinions 

 given of its medicinal virtues be correct, it is well 

 worth cultivation ; and the notice we are about to 

 take of It, is de.scribing an easy method of hav- 

 ing it in great perfection throughout the winter 

 months, and up to the time it may be gathered 

 from the natural ground. 



Prepare one or more beds [with alley? two feet 

 wide between] for the reception of the seeds, in 

 the fo'lowing manner : — mark out the bed or beds 

 two and a half feet wide, and of any required 

 length, as near as can be from east to west ; line 

 off the sides and ends, driving a stake at each 

 corner to ascertain the boundary ; dig out the 

 earth of the bed one spade deep, removing it to 

 some distance; fill this e.xravation with the purest 

 and finest sand which ran be procured in the 

 neighborhood, either from the sea shore, the bed 

 of a river, or from a pit. It signifies nothing of 

 what color it is, so it be pure, and as free from 

 3oam as it can be had ; for in proportion as the 

 soil of the bed is poor or rich, so will the flavor 

 of the plant be when dressed. When this precau 

 tion is not taken, and when the plants are suffer- 

 ed to enjoy the rich and cultivated soil of a kitch- 

 en garden, or the situation made so, by rich dress, 

 ings or coverings of fresh manure, the plants are 

 stimulated into an unnatural luxuriance, which 

 deteriorates the flavor, imparting to them that 

 strong disagreeable scent and taste, resembling 

 common cabbage, than which nothing can be a 

 greater drawback on the value of the vegetable; 

 but when grown entirely in pure sand, the flavor 

 is mild and pleasant, and is relished by most pa- 

 lates. 



When the bed is filled with sand, and raised 

 therewith about si.v inches above the level of the 

 ground, [and this should be done previous to the 

 end of March, which is the sowing season,] draw 

 a drill along the n,iddle, from end to end, about 

 three inches deep, in which drop the seeds pretty 

 thickly, as they can be thinned out to the proper 

 distance after they come up. If the sand or wea- 

 ther be dry at the time of sowing, give a little 

 water in the drill and immediately cover up. If 

 the seed be good, the plants will soon appear, and 

 when they are advanced to a size large enough 

 to enable the gardener to choose the most promis- 

 ing, let tiiem be thinned uut to the distance of six 

 or seven inches, the distance at which they may 



winter after sowing, a part of one end of the bed 

 should be prepare 1 for forcing. For this purpose, 

 and in order that it should be done with facility 

 and effect, a rough wooden frame should be raa<le 

 eighteen inches high behind, and one foot high in 

 front, r^hapeu like a common ho*, bed frame, and of 

 any convenion* and portable length ; and in width 

 the same as ,the bed. Wooden covers should be 

 fixed with hinges to the back ; these may be rais- 

 ed at any time, for the admission of light and air, 

 ■ind in fine weather may be thrown entirely back. 

 When the frames are placed, dig out the rJleys 

 one foot deep to receive linings of dung, which 

 may be banked up against the back and front of 

 the frame. The surf.ice of the bed within the 

 frame must be covered with soft, short straw, or 

 hay, nine inches thick, to arrest the heat which 

 rises from the linings, and form that warm humid 

 region into which the shoots will advance. The 

 temperature of these dark frames must be regu- 

 lated by due attendance. In very cold, or frosty 

 weather, the frames at night will require a cover- 

 ing of mats or litter. 



The required supply of the family — the time for 

 it, and the length and number of the frames, must 

 be judged of by the gardener, and who will act 

 accorilingly ; but two frames are indispensable ; 

 because the second should be considerably ad- 

 vanced by the time the crop in the first is all cut. 

 Young plants may be transplanted ; and if they 

 are to be had, they may be tried ; but the safer 

 way is to sow and plant both, to prevent disap- 

 pointme.it ; and in order that the roots be not too 

 much exhausted by forcing, one bed should be 

 forced in one year, and another the next. 



The crowns of the roots have a tendency to 

 rise — and as annual additions of sand will be re- 

 quired after the autumnal dressing, the beds by 

 these additions become unsightly ; but cutting ofl": 

 the most aspiring, with its flowering stem, every 

 summer, will keep the whole within bounds. In 

 stead of covering with dung or litter, to protect 

 from winter frosts, the frames may be set on those 

 parts intended to be forced, to answer that pur- 

 pose.' The uncovered parts of the beds may re- 

 ceive a coat of mould out of the alleys, to be taken 

 off the sand in the spring. 



The writer of thi^ article, began to force sea- 

 kale as long ago as 1798, using hot dung within 

 as well as without, a frame with glazed lights ; — 

 but soon found, that neither the glass nor dung 

 tnsi''" was necessary or suitable. He afterwards 

 succeeded by the above plan, to produce the finest 

 crops of this vegetable, at any time in the winter, 



and can confidently recommend such management, 

 especially to those who have no hot bouse or hot 

 bed frames; because, when there is an early forc- 

 ing house, oi' frames, if old roots are properly se- 

 lected and potted in the autumn, and placed in 

 such houses or frames, where there is sufficient 

 heat, and well shut up from light by putting emp- 

 ty pots over them, a crop may be had in this 

 way, without the trouble and expense of out-door 

 forcing. 



FOB THE NEW ENGLA.'JD FARMER. 



HORSES. 



Sir, — In my first communication, for "are noble 

 animals, — and" read " are noble animals : and ;'' 

 a colon will) no dash. The printer's accidentallj' 

 cutting up an integral paragrapn into three, has in 

 some degree affected the sense of a large purt of 

 that comnuinication : in my remarks upon the pe- 

 culiar advantages and disadvantages of the thor- 

 ough-bred horse, I did not intend to be under- 

 stood that he never stumbled but in one way, or 

 that he was liable to become unsound no where but. 

 in his foot ; but that he was more apt than other 

 horses to fall in a manner which I there described, 

 more apt to catch behind, and rather more subject 

 than other horses to <bot-lamenPss : wiiich last 

 fact I ascribe to the peculiar nanner in which this 

 English variety of the Arabian, has for a succes- 

 sion of generations been treated. However, for 

 coach work, which is so much on the increase in 

 Massachus'^t's, we should have horses capable of 

 violent occasional exertion, and to breed Ihein, let 

 a man try what he pleases, he will always eventu- 

 ally look to blood. A single careless incroachment 

 upon his powers, the coarse horse is somehow or 

 other, ever afterwards the weaker for. My obser- 

 vation that the true Cleveland Bay is confined to 

 the County of York, is not entirely correct, he 

 having been always to be found in the bordering 

 County of Durham. It is going rather too far, to 

 assert that all a horse's diseases not arising frorc 

 contagion, assume an inflammatory form, but it is 

 very near the truth. I will now make a few re 

 marks upon the question of foot-lameness. 



The chrcnick lameness in one or both of theii 

 fore feet, and which never occurs in their hint 

 ones, from which the superior orders of horses suf- 

 fer more pain than from all other diseases put to- 

 gether, has given great occasion to inquiries and 

 theories. It is rather remarkable, thatmost of the 

 methods of accounting for it, have till of late 

 years gone upon the ground of the deviation froK 

 nature of the form ofhouf, which universally takes 

 place, in some degree or other, when the horse ie 

 shod, and kept in the stable ; and none of thenj 

 upon that of the joints within the hoof being in- 

 jured by the concussion and strains, to which they 

 are exposed in fast work : and the disposition o! 

 all inflammation near a join' to be transferred tc 

 it. The sporting and the veterinary world bo'L 

 decided, that it usually proceedel from something 

 wron? about the hoof, with which the internal foot, 

 had no part of it originally any concern. They 

 now go the other way, and assert that contractioc 

 of the hoof is generally consequent to internal dis- 

 ease Poot-lameness should be a subject of some 

 interest to tlie public, for it dooms a very largf 



