250 Culture of the Chicory, 



potatoes. By this plan the potatoes do not get at the dung, 

 until they are in a fit state to bear it without injuring their 

 flavour. I plant the dahlias 5 ft. asunder between the wide 

 rows of potatoes, placing a stake about 2 ft. high to each plant, 

 for the purpose of supporting it, and marking the place where 

 a taller stake is afterwards to be placed. In July and August, 

 the potatoes are taken up, and the ground cleared. If the 

 weather should be dry, and the dahlias likely to require water, 

 I then make basins round the plants before levelling the soil. 

 Since I have adopted this plan, I have had a more abundant 

 crop of potatoes, and of better flavour ; and, instead of the 

 ground appearing as if lying waste after they are gathered, I 

 have something to look at. As my garden rises on each side 

 from the centre walk, I can assure you the dahlias, when the 

 polours are well mixed, make a very pretty appearance. 

 Saffro7i Waldcn, March 9. 1836. 



Art. XII. On the Culture of the Chicory as a Salad Plants as 

 practised in Belgium. By Dr. Lippold, Author of the " Taschen- 

 buch der verstandigen Gartners." 



During my journey through Belgium, in the months of Ja- 

 nuary and February of the year 1834, I was struck with seeing 

 a winter salad on the landlord's table, and another in the vege- 

 table market, which recommended themselves as much to the eye 

 by their beautifully yellow and red speckled leaves, as to the taste 

 by their agreeable bitter. I enquired the name of this salad, and 

 was informed that it was called the Chicoree de Bruges all 

 over Belgium. It is grown in a cellar, like the wild chicory 

 (Cichorium /'ntybus L,.), which the Parisian vegetable-growers 

 bring in such quantities to market, and which is called, jocosely, 

 Barbe de Capucin. There is, however, one difference : the thick 

 roots of the Chicoree de Bruges produce broad leaves, and lux- 

 uriant young shoots ; whilst the roots of the Barbe de Capucin, 

 or wild chicory, have such small leaves, that a bundle of fifty 

 roots scarcely produces a moderately sized plateful of salad ; while 

 from one dozen of roots of the other a good-sized dish of salad 

 can be obtained. My predilection for garden culture induced 

 me to procure seeds of this vegetable, and the following inform- 

 ation for its cultivation. 



The seed is sown about midsummer, in deeply dug garden soil, 

 well manured with rotten dung : it should be but thinly sown, so 

 that the plants may have sufficient space to grow. When the 

 young plants produce leaves, they should be thinned, so that each 

 plant may stand at least 1ft. apart from the others. Those that 



