654 Bicton Gardens, their Culture and Management. 



bed in a great hurry, and look round amongst their neighbours 

 for plants. 



I have known gardeners put their employers to great and 

 unnecessary expense, and themselves to unnecessary trouble, 

 and after all succeed but indifferently. 



I have seen gardeners make a bed of strong hot stable dung, 

 and other fermenting materials, from 3 ft. 6 in. to 5 ft. 6 in. in 

 height ; and I believe there are hundreds who follow up the same 

 plan at this very time. Now, if they were only to consider this 

 properly, would they find that the nature of the plant required 

 it ? I say, certainly not. Then why continue to follow up 

 such an absurd practice ? It appears to me, and always strikes 

 me, when observing the hotbed cairied up to such an unreason- 

 able height, that it is either to make it appear conspicuous to 

 every observer, that a cucumber-bed exists in the garden, or 

 that it may be awkward and troublesome for their employers to 

 look into. Why should that be ? What need has a gardener 

 to object to his employer looking into a cucumber-frame, when 

 the plants are in a healthy state and doing well, any more than 

 into a hothouse. I have seen those unreasonably high hotbeds 

 lined afterwards strongly with hot fermenting materials, and 

 large holes bored all through the beds, to cause the heat to 

 circulate strongly and rankly through the bottom. A little 

 consideration will quickly show such practice to be entirely 

 against nature. Can it be reasonably thought that they get 

 such a strong fermenting heat at their roots in their natural 

 climate? I should fancy not, and have therefore for many 

 years left off the practice ; and I am perfectly convinced, were 

 that old absurd practice entirely dispensed with, cucumbers 

 would be produced with more certainty, in greater abundance, 

 in better perfection, and with much less expense and trouble. 

 I often wonder how much longer those absurd and unnatural 

 practices are to exist. It would give me great pleasure to see 

 the practical part of cucumber-growing better understood. A 

 man may be in full practice the whole of his life, and yet he 

 may never have once considei'ed whether he was following the 

 system most natural for the production of any one thing under 

 his charge ; but go on in some way or other, because he has 

 observed others do the same. A man may read all the books 

 that have been written on any subject; but what is the utility 

 of it if he has had no practice, or has not a mind of his own, 

 properly to reflect on what he is about to do, and what is the 

 most natural metliod of producing any one thing he is about to 

 aim at ? Until that is fully weighed, things will continue in the 

 present unnatural state. 



The proper system to cultivate and produce cucumbers all 

 the year round is very simple and easy, and can be summed up 



