Book I. CULTURE AND MANAGEMENT OF THE SOIL. 



485 



in full bearing, will, to the spectator within, present a vault of fruit and foliage, such as 

 lias not hitherto been displayed in any British garden. 



2544. The subject of cyder and perry orchards we consider as belonging more to 

 agriculture than horticulture. (See Encyc of Agriculture, part iii.) 



Chap. IV. 



Of the general Cultivation and Management of a Kitchen- garden. 



9515. The cultivation of a garden includes the performance of all those things that are 

 requisite, in order to a reasonable and prolific production of the various vegetables and 

 fruits grown therein. By the management of a garden, is to be understood the keei)ing 

 it in such order, as that it may not fail in those impressions of pleasure it is calculated to 

 afford. A kitchen-garden, as well as a garden professedly ornamental, may and ought 

 to be agreeable to walk in, as well as profitably cultivated. A gardener may be well 

 acquainted with the culture of individual vegetables and fruits, and yet very deficient in 

 the general cultivation and management of his garden. The following sections relate 

 entirely to general practices conducive to these objects, and they deserve to be carefully 

 studied by the young gardener who aspires at any degree of eminence in his art. 



Sect. I. Culture and Management of the Soil. 



2546. The soil, Marshall observes, " must be first attended to, always to keep the 

 fruit-borders in heart, and the compartments in a proper state for use, when called upon to 

 receive either seeds or plants. Ground should never lie long without stirring ; for the 

 soil of a garden should be in a free, sweet, and rich state, by proper digging, &c. or no 

 great things can be done, as to early, handsome, or well flavored productions. It- 

 should be free, that the roots of plants may not be impeded in the quest of food ; sweet, 

 that the food may be wholesome ; and rich, that there may be no defect of nutriment. 



2547. Trenching the vacant ground in a garden does good to all soils in the autumn 

 and winter seasons, and that in proportion to its strength, being indispensably necessary 

 for clays to separate and ameliorate the parts. The light soils may do by being only 

 rough dug, which is a method that stronger soils vdW be also benefitted by. The soil 

 would be stilL ferther improved, by re-trenching, or rough-digging, once or twice more 

 in the winter, if the opportunity offers, particularly if strong or stubborn. Let the 

 ridges lie E. and W. except the ground be a slope, when they may correspond. 



2548. The trenching of vacant ground, Abercrombie observes, " should be forwarded 

 as much as possible in winter, and early in spring. By repeatedly exposing a new sur- 

 face to the action of the frost, a greater quantity of the soil is ameliorated. In every 

 case where it is intended that the ground shall lie fallow any time, it is advisable, in 

 digging trenches, to turn up the earth roughly in ridges ; forming, parallel to each 

 trench, a single ridge of the same width, in order that the soil may be the more 

 effectually mellowed, pulverised, and renovated by the weather. These ridges can be 

 expeditiously levelled, for the reception of seeds and plants ; which is a further improve- 

 ment of the ground." 



2549. To conserve the fertility of kitchen-garden soil, the mode adopted by Nicol and 

 practised by the best Scotch gardeners, is the most scientific of any. Nicol observes, 

 that, as kitchen- vegetables do best on what is termed new land, it is a common complaint 

 among gardeners that their ground, by being, as it were, worn out, will not produce 

 cei-tain kinds of vegetables ; not that it is poor and hungry, or altogether unfitted to the 

 production of them, having formerly produced them in great abundance, but that the 

 surface has become tired of these crops, in the same way as a field sown with the same 

 sort of grain for two or three years in succession, ceases to produce that grain in perfec- 

 tion. The method which he practised with success is as follows : — 



2550. First, it is necessary to have a depth of soil from twenty-four to thirty-six inches ; in which 

 case it is obvious, that whatever the depth of the natural soil is deficient of, twenty-four inches must be 

 made good by carrying in soil from fields of good quality. Then take three crops offthe first surface, and 

 then trench ^'<r(?<? spit deep, by which the bottom and top are reversed, and the middle remains in the 

 middle Take three crops off this surface, and then trench two spit ; by which the top becomes the middle, 

 and the middle the top. And take also three crops off this surface, and then trench three spit ; whereby 

 that which was last the middle, and now top, becomes the bottom ; and. that which is now the bottom, 

 and was the surface at first, now becomes surface again, after having rested six years. Proceed in this 

 manner alternately ; the one time trenching two spit deep, and the other three 3 by which means the sur- 

 face will always be changed, and will rest six years, and produce three. 



Hence there will always be new soil in the garden for the production of whole so^ne vegetables; and 

 hence also will much less manure be required, than when the soil is shallow, and the same surface con- 

 stantly in crop He adds, that he would not advise the soil to be more than three feet deep, as the sur- 

 face might be liuried too deep from the action of the weather, and influence of the sun. Where the soil is 

 only so deep as to allow of trenching two spit, by trenching every third or fourth year the ground will rest 

 half its time • and if judiciously managed, and cropped in proper rotation, wholesome vegetables may be 



