FORCING DEPARTMENT. 439 



SEA-KALE. 



This is reckoned one of the most valuable esculent 

 vegetables that is indigenous to Britain, that we 

 have got ; and when accelerated by artificial heat, it 

 is considered by many to be equal, or but little 

 inferior to the Asparagus. The shoots of the Sea- 

 Kale,, when blanched, are extremely useful in Culi- 

 nary dishes, during the Winter months, and are, at 

 that period of the year, a luxury at table. 



Various methods have, in consequence, been 

 resorted to for bringing it to perfection at an early 

 season, when there is a scarcity of other vegetables. 

 But the more general and equally successful mode 

 adapted for its cultivation, is by covering the beds or 

 ridges on which the Sea-Kale is growing in the 

 natural ground, with hot stable dung, or a mixture of 

 dung and tree leaves. The beds selected for this 

 purpose, should consist of strong crowns, whose roots 

 have got well established in the ground. Those 

 crowns that were planted the preceding Spring, if 

 well supplied with water in dry weather, while 

 striking root, will be fit for accelerating the ensuing- 

 Winter. 



The decayed leaves and stems of the plants 

 should be all cleared away, and the surface of the 

 beds stirred up and cleared from weeds and filth ; 

 and then a covering of old tan, leaf- mould, or coal 

 ashes, spread over them ; then over each crown 



