16 THE FAEM. 



spinach and asparagus, the ground can scarcely be too rich, and the 

 bulk of the manures may be applied to them and the cabbage and turnip 

 crops; while for plants raised for seed, it is best that the foliage should 

 not be stimulated into too great luxuriance. 



PARTICULAR VEGETABLES.— We now proceed to give special direc- 

 tions for the culture, preservation and use of the several garden vegeta- 

 bles enumerated at the beginning of this article. 



Artichoke.— May be raised from seeds, or young suckers taken from 

 old plants in the spring. The best way is to sow the seed early in 

 April, in well prepared soil, in drills one inch deep and twelve inches 

 apart. A cool moist soil suits them best. The plants should be kept 

 free from weeds ; and when from nine to twelve inches high should bo 

 transplanted into deep and rich soil. The rows should be five feet 

 apart, and the plants two feet distant from each other in the rows. In 

 the north it requires winter protection, which maybe given it by dress- 

 ing the earth around the plants from between the rows, and an addition 

 of a layer of coarse litter. In the spring the litter must be removed 

 and the ground leveled. The strongest stools are left to produce heads 

 and the weaker pinched off. The ground should be dug and manured 

 in the spring. This vegetable is not profitable, and is chiefly grown as 

 a luxury. 



Asparagus may be raised by sowing the seed in the fall as soon as 

 ripe, or in March and the early part of April. One ounce of seed will 

 produce about a thousand plants. It requires some of the best ground 

 in the garden. The seed may bo sown in drills, ten or twelve inches 

 asunder, and covered about an inch with light earth. When the plants 

 are up, they will need a careful hoeing, and if well cultivated, and kept 

 free from weeds, they will be large enough to transplant when they 

 are a year old. Some keep them in the nursery-bed until they are two 

 years old. 



A plantation of asparagus, if the beds are properly dressed every 

 year, will produce good buds for twenty years or more. 



New plantations of asparagus may be made in autumn, or before the 

 buds get far advanced in spring, say in February, March, or April, ac- 

 cording to situation and circumstances. The ground for the bed must 

 not be wet, nor too strong or stubborn, but such as is moderately light 

 and pliable, so that it will readily fall to pieces in digging or raking, 

 and in a situation that enjoys the full rays of the sun. It should have 

 a large supply of well rotted dung, three or four inches thick, and then 

 be regnlarly trenched two spades deep, and the dung buried equally in 

 each trench twelve or fifteen inches below the surface. When this 

 trenching is done, lay two or three inches of thoroughly rotted manure 

 over the whole surface, and dig the gronnd over again eight or ten 

 inches deep, mixing this top dressing, and incorporating it well with the 

 earth. 



In family gardens, it is customary to divide the ground thus prepared 

 into beds, allowing four feet for every four rows of plants, with alleys 

 two feet and a half wide between the beds. Strain your line along the 

 bed six inches from the alley, the plants to be ten or twelve inches dis 

 tant in the row, and the rows to be twelve inches apart. 



