86 



KITCHEN GARDEN PLANTS, 



[chap. 



them with very small heads, no bigger than a crown piece, you 

 may, by taking the plants up, and putting their roots in sand in a 

 shed or cellar, have some tolerably good cauliflowers at Christmas. 

 I, having endeavoured one year to raise cauliflowers in Pennsylvania, 

 where they will not flower in summer on account of the excessive 

 heat, which continually keeps the heart open and prevents the head 

 from coming up, took my plants, in the month of November, when 

 their heads w^ere just beginning to appear, and buried them in the 

 garden, according to the fashion of that country, observed in the 

 burying of cabbages ; that is to say, to place the cabbages along in 

 a row, close to each other, the head upon the level ground, and 

 the roots standing up in the air, and then to go on each side with 

 a spade, and throw up earth in such a manner as completely to 

 cover the heads and the leaves of the cabbages. Indeed, my cauli- 

 flowers went into the ground in company with some cabbages ; 

 and, to my great surprise, when we took up the part of the stock 

 in which the cauliflowers were, the greater part of them had heads 

 as big as an ordinary tea-cup. But this method would not do in 

 England ; for we have wet as well as frost ; and, in Pennsylvania, 

 when once the earth is safely locked up by the frost, there comes 

 no wet to sink into little ridges such as I have described. 1 think, 

 however, that, if hung up by the heels in a barn or a shed in No- 

 vember, cauliflowers would augment their size as much as if put 

 into sand in a cave. If you attempt to save cauliflower-seed, no 

 pains that you can take would possibly be too great. First look 

 over your stock of heads : you will see some of them less compact 

 than the others : more uneven, and more loose : round the edges 

 of the heads, you will see almost perfect smoothness in some, and, 

 in others, you will see a little sort of fringe appearing even before 

 the head comes to its full bigness ; and these heads, which are not 

 so compact as the others, will be less white, and drawing towards 

 a cream colour. Now observe, it is the compact, the smooth, the 

 white, head, of which you ought to save the seed ; and, though it 

 will bear much less seed than a loose head, it will be good : you 

 can rely upon it ; and that is more than you can upon any seed 

 that you purchase, though it come from Italy, whence this fine 

 vegetable originally came. There remains to notice only that 

 the sun is apt to scorch the heads of cauliflowers, and to make 

 them of a brownish hue, which prepares them for rotting if much 

 wet afterwards come upon them. To protect them from this. 



