JAN."! THE GARDENER. 81 



also some of the larger kinds, should be sown in warm 

 quarters, and even radishes and carrots, in open 

 ground with some means of protection in case of frost. 

 Mushroom beds, made in one of the previous months, 

 will require in wet weather protection by some sort of 

 covering to keep them in a dry and warm state. 

 There can be no real difficulty in having mushrooms 

 all the year round; I shall, however, reserve the di- 

 rections respecting their formation until I come to one 

 of the concluding months. 



Melon and cucumber beds, are now to be made. 

 Prepare a hotbed thus ; Take of fresh horse-litter dang 

 as much as you may require, to the place where the 

 bed is to be made, and shake it very carefully with a 

 prong that the straw may be separated, and yet the 

 whole mass blended together into a heap, somewhat 

 more pointed than one of those little haycocks 

 known by the name of hobblers, the summit being 

 crowned with the short dung which fell in the shaking, 

 and which should be carefully shovelled up. Mr. 

 Cobbett, who was a capital gardener, recommends* that 

 this heap should be turned over and shaken to pieces, 

 and remade three times in nine days ; and he considers 

 that three such previous fermentations are sufficient ; 

 and that without this, the heat of the bed (unless the 

 dung be very short at the beginning) will not be last- 

 ing nor regular, and that the bed itself would not be 

 solid nor uniform. 



Mr. Loudon considered, that it generally requires to 

 lie a month in a heap (turned three times), before it is 

 fit for a common hotbed. The state of the weather, 

 however, must be considered, for in hard frosts or 

 chilling rains the tendency to fermentation is very 

 much lessened;! while in warm weather it is greatly 

 iucreased. Whatever be the previous circumstances, 



* In his English Gardener, 

 f It is therefore desirable to have the dang under a shed. 

 I? 



