12 
novice must examine them by carefully opening the leaves on 
the shady side, and so long as growth is apparent and the curd 
remains solid withont disposition to burst or become spongy 
they may remain, but it will be better to cut them full young 
rather than take chances of having them spoiled. Theyshould 
be cut below the leaves, using a large knife or heavy instrument, 
and removed to the barn or packing shed where the leaves 
should be trimmed down almost to a level of the head, and if 
they are too abundant,some of the lower ones with a por- 
tion of the remaining stalk should be cut away, only enough 
leaves being required to protect the head from injury, and if 
the stock is very fine it will pay to use white tissue or tea paper 
to cover the head, tucking the edges under the leaves which 
will preclude the possibility of staining. The usual method of 
shipping to market is in barrels, in which the heads are care- 
fully and snugly packed, and covered witha coarse cloth nailed 
over the top, but I think a strong box or crate, latticed, of 
about one barrel capacity is far preferable. It often happens 
that our growers have many Cauliflowers in the fields at the 
approach of winter. These are taken up root and all, with as 
much earth as will stick, conveyed to cellars and pits and stored 
as thick as they can stand, where they continue to grow, and 
shipments even as late as the middle of January are not un- 
common. 
VARIETIES. The varieties are not numerous; one who 
wrote many years since declared there were but two—early 
and late—and scarcely any difference between them. 
Most writers however admit a marked distinction in three 
or four sorts. Fearing Burr in his “Vegetables of America” 
describes sixteen varieties and sub-varieties but notes that 
“varieties proper’ are comparatively few in number; the dis- 
tinctions, in many Instances, being quite unimportant. With a 
wide field of observation and extended experiments not only 
personally but by our best growers, I find a very marked dif- 
ference in the color and form of the foliage, habit of growth 
solidity of the head, time required to mature, etc, etc. The 
“Erfurts” are easily distinguished by their clean cut leaves of a 
light or pea green color and produce the finest, most compact, 
whi.ust and heaviest heads. The “Erfurt Large White Early” 
