CHAPTER IV 



THE HANDLING OP THE LAND 



Almost any land contains enough food for the growing of 

 good crops, but the food elements may be chemically unavail- 

 able, or there may be insufficient water to dissolve them. It 

 is too long a story to explain at this place, — the philosophy of 

 tillage and of enriching the land, — and the reader who desires 

 to make excursions into this delightful subject should consult 

 King on "The Soil," Roberts on "The Fertility of the Land," 

 and recent writings of many kinds. The reader must accept 

 my word for it that tilling the land renders it productive. 



I must call my reader's attention to the fact that this book 

 is on the making of gardens, — on the planning and the doing 

 of the work from the year's end to end, — not on the apprecia- 

 tion of a completed garden. I want the reader to know that a 

 garden is not worth having unless he makes it with his own 

 hands or helps to make it. He must work himself into it. 

 He must know the pleasure of preparing the land, of contend- 

 ing with bugs and all other difficulties, for it is only thereby 

 that he comes into appreciation of the real value of a garden. 



I am saying this to prepare the reader for the work that I 

 lay out in this chapter. I want him to know the real joy that 

 there is in the simple processes of breaking the earth and fitting 

 it for the seed. The more pains he takes with these processes, 

 naturally the keener will be his enjoyment of them. No one 

 can have any other satisfaction than that of mere manual exer- 

 cise if he does not know the reasons for what he does with his 

 soil. I am sure that my keenest delight in a garden comes in 

 the one month of the opening season and the other month of 



87 



