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CULINARY OR KITCHEN GARDEN. 



from the stem than others. These are 

 chiefly to be found amongst the late sorts. 

 Most of the early ones produce theirs close 

 to the stem, or at the extremity of very 

 short runners, seldom more than 9 inches 

 from the stem. The blossom should be 

 cut off as soon as it appears, for most of 

 the evil will be effected if the process is 

 delayed until the fruit is formed. What- 

 ever may be said of curtailing the stems, 

 even when they encroach on other crops, 

 nothing but dire necessity would induce 

 us to do anything of the kind. Cutting 

 the haulm off entirely as soon as the 

 plants have produced their flowers, as re- 

 commended by M. Tombelle Lomba as a 

 remedy against the disease, has by no 

 means been satisfactorily proved to have 

 that effect; but it has an effect which 

 might naturally be supposed — that of very 

 materially diminishing the crop. If the 

 disease is purely atmospheric, it is natural 

 to suppose the leaves and stems would be 

 first affected, as their office is to collect 

 and elaborate the matter they throw into 

 the roots and tubers; and, in doing this, 

 they would at the same time transmit the 

 disease along with that matter. As a na- 

 tural cou sequence, we are bound to be- 

 lieve that the leaves become affected by 

 the disease before its effects become so 

 evident in them as to be observed by 

 man, and hence the transmission of it to 

 the roots must be going on before any 

 visible symptoms appear in the leaves 

 themselves ; and if they are allowed to 

 remain on until the plants have perfected 

 their flowers, the roots will be as much 

 inoculated by that time as if the leaves 

 and stems were left on altogether. So 

 rapid is the transmission of the disease to 

 the tubers, that we have traced symptoms 

 of it in them before any visible signs of it 

 appeared in the leaves, and to such an ex- 

 tent in one case as led us to inquire if the 

 disease might not originate in the soil or 

 manure, affecting the roots first, afterwards 

 the tubers, and lastly the stalks and leaves 

 — reversing the generally supposed order. 

 If, therefore, any beneficial results are to 

 arise from cutting off the haulm at all, 

 it must be done much sooner than has 

 hitherto been recommended; and by doing 

 so, the supplies will be entirely cut off, and 

 the tubers reduced to the identical cir- 

 cumstances of those that are sometimes 

 kept over a year, and buried in sand in a 



dark cellar, and which are known to send 

 out numerous immaturely-formed potatoes 

 from their sides, without the aid of haulm 

 or leaves — a practice sometimes adopted 

 to produce young potatoes during winter. 

 No doubt the opinion laid down by Dr 

 Lindley is quite correct, when speaking of 

 the possibility of the tubers ripening after 

 the haulm has been removed, after it has ar- 

 rived at a certain condition; but before it has 

 arrived at this condition (the season of 

 flowering), has not the disease already been 

 transmitted to the tubers? The rationale of 

 his views is thus given by Mr Stephens in 

 " The Book of the Farm," vol. ii. p. 258 : 

 " That it may be that potato tubers, after 

 having arrived at a certain condition, 

 possess the power of continuing their 

 growth by their own proper and unassist- 

 ed vitality ; and this is rendered the 

 more probable by the well-known fact, 

 that the flour which gives them their 

 principal value does not descend directly 

 from the leaves as flour, but is in the first 

 instance of the nature of gum, or some 

 othe fluid organisable matter, formed in 

 the leaves and sent downwards into the 

 tubers. Having reached the tubers, it 

 undergoes its final change, and from a 

 soluble substance is gradually converted 

 by their vital force into insoluble flour. 

 To that vital operation we have no rea- 

 son to suppose that the leaves contribute : 

 all that they do is to produce the matter 

 out of which the tubers generate the flour. 

 It must be observed that M. Tombelle 

 Lomba does not cut off the stems till 

 after flowering. It is possible that at 

 that time the leaves of the potato have 

 done their work as far as the tubers are 

 concerned, and that their further duty is 

 to nourish the tubers. If so, we have an 

 explanation of the result of which M. 

 Lomba so positively speaks." Not only, 

 according to M. Lomba's assertion, is the 

 disease arrested in its progress by cutting 

 off the haulm, but the tubers suffer no di- 

 minution in size after the operation. This 

 latter assertion has been by no means 

 proved in practice, in this country at least, 

 to be correct. 



Soil and manure. — Potatoes succeed best 

 on newly-reclaimed land, provided it be 

 light and dry ; and in newly-broken-up 

 light rich loam they will succeed better 

 without manure than with it, and, if less 

 weighty in crop, will be of improved fla- 



