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Baltimore Oak-leaved butter bunching. A peculiar 

 variety, with lobed leaves, grown in the South, but 

 very poor quality. Slow to shoot to seed 



Asparagus. A peculiar cos sort but little grown. 

 Good for cooking; or the large hard midrib may be 

 served like celery. The leaf is of very poor quality 



Prize Head is the most largely grown of all the 

 crisp bunching varieties. Slow to shoot to seed, and 

 excellent for summer use. Quality good 



Century and Hartford Bronzed Head are 

 so delicate and so tender that only real 

 connoisseurs care to grow them. The 

 leaves of this class are soft, almost oily in 

 texture, the veins small, and the edge of the 

 leaf smooth, or nearly so. 



The "crisp" varieties are harder of tex- 

 ture, the leaf is more or less fringed, and the 

 midrib and veins are large. Grand Rapids 

 is a well-known variety of this type, .which 

 is a favorite with market gardeners, because 

 the harder, crisper leaves stand shipping so 

 much better than do the soft ones of the 

 butter class. 



In the "cos" or "romaine" lettuce we get 

 a totally distinct type of long, very hard leaf, 

 with coarse midrib and veins. They stand 

 shipping well, and are much stronger in 

 flavor than either of the others. For table 

 use the leaves generally have to be cut, as 

 they do not break easily, and so they make a 

 less attractive appearance than either butter 

 or crisp kinds. English gardeners and 

 English cooks rate the cos lettuces very 

 highly, but its quality in America is not up 

 to the British standard. These varieties are 

 good for hot weather, however, and have a 

 pungency and sweetness quite different from 

 what is found elsewhere. The amateur 

 should try a few plants of Paris White Cos. 



THE "CABBAGE" AND " BUNCHING" HEAD 



Not all lettuces make solid heads. People 

 who like the young, tender, blanched inner 



leaves of cabbage-head lettuce must be care- 

 ful to select a variety that is not a "buncher. " 

 Each of the three classes already described 

 contains varieties that are normally either 

 heading, or bunching, though in describing 

 the cos class the terms "self closing" and 

 "loose" are used to express the same ideas. 



All these points are worth knowing when 

 studying the catalogues to decide upon one's 

 purchase. We would never grow a bunch- 

 ing variety for our own use, in spite of the 

 big fact that Prize Head, a distinctly bunch- 

 ing crisp, is the most largely grown of all the 

 hundred varieties offered in the trade to-day. 



Broadly speaking, the season of a head 

 lettuce is shorter than that of a bunching, 

 because when it begins to "bolt" or "shoot" 

 to seed, its head is spoilt, and it is rejected, 

 whereas in a bunching variety the beginning 

 of a " bolt " is not so evident. The remedy 

 is to make many successive sowings. More- 

 over, it is easier to grow the bunching varieties. 



COLOR AND QUALITY 



Generally the best quality (delicacy of 

 flavor and tenderness of texture), is asso- 

 ciated with pale, thin foliage. The thick, 

 coarse, and green leaves of the Big Boston 

 are decidedly poorer in all the "quality" 

 attributes. Some varieties have more or 

 less brown on the leaves, which is sometimes 

 thought to indicate intensity of flavor, but it 

 is an utterly unreliable guide to quality, as 

 Hartford Bronzed Head is probably one of 



the very highest in quality — tender and de- 

 licate to a superlative degree. 



LETTUCES FOR SPECIAL PURPOSES 



The most popular varieties — that is, those 

 whose names have come to be a household 

 word among us; Big Boston, Grand Rapids, 

 and Prize Head, for example, — naturally do 

 not represent the highest degree of quality. 

 The most popularly known are those that are 

 notoriously good shippers, whereas the actual 

 standard of value for the home garden could 

 be measured inversely by that standard. 



We want the tenderest, most delicately 

 flavored, not necessarily large; and even the 

 quality of cropping uniformly may be a 

 disadvantage, giving a plethora of heads for 

 a few days, and then nothing. Here are 

 some selections by Mr. W. W. Tracy, Jr., 

 of the U. S. Department of Agriculture, 

 who has grown all the lettuces offered by the 

 seedsmen. * 



FOR HOME USE 



Deacon, butter heading, thick, soft leaves, 

 grows everywhere: Good for summer, inter- 

 mediate season. 



Hartford Bronzed Head (Crisp-as-Ice) 

 butter heading, dark brown foliage, inter- 

 mediate season, good for summer. 



* American Varieties of Lettuce, Bulletin No. 69. 

 Bureau of Plant Industry. This is the best monograph 

 of any vegetable yet published and it is to be hoped that 

 others of the same stamp will be forthcoming. 





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Big Boston, a popular butter heading lettuce for 

 late summer and autumn use. Grows well every- 

 where, but there are better quality varieties 





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Asparagus Lobed-leaved, larger and slower to 

 shoot to seed than Asparagus, but no better in quality. 

 Rough, hard, and rank fl'vor, except the midrib 



319 



Black Seeded Simpson, crisp heading, is recom- 

 mended for use in the dog days. Its quality is not 

 of the best, but it is reliable and easily grown 



