12 



HOW TO GROW 



for food in a wider range of ground. If the soil 

 has been left in good, rich condition by the pre- 

 ceding crop, forty or fifty two-horse loads of good 

 stable manure will secure a fine, large crop of late 

 cabbages, if the other conditions be fairly favor- 

 able. Any kind of readily soluble manure may 

 be turned to good advantage by cabbages. On 

 the lighter soils, not naturally well adapted for 

 growing cabbage, cow and pig dung, owing to 

 their more consistent character and retentiveness 

 of moisture, may be used to great advantage. 

 The various artificial manures, especially super- 

 phosphate of lime, bone flour and guano, and 

 poudrette (or dry prepared human excrements), 

 liberally applied, will wonderfully increase the 

 quantity and quality of the cabbage crop. 



I have this year growing a lot of cabbages, the 

 grandest any one could wish to look at, on a piece 

 of ground that has received no manure at all, 

 natural or artificial, from my hands; but the 

 secret is this, that the ground in question for a 

 couple of years had been a roaming place for my 

 poultry. The soil was previously a rather im- 

 poverished, dead, clayey field, having received no 

 manure for years. The luxuriant growth of the 

 cabbages and cauliflowers this first year of using 

 the ground for gardening purposes is due to the 

 random droppings of the fowls during the pre- 

 ceding two or three years — the birds not having 

 even been exclusively confined to the ground 

 in question — and to a thorough, deep digging 



