466 



THE MARKET GARDENS OF PARIS. 



Nobody could pass suddenly^ as I Lave done^ from onr own 

 markets and market gardens to tliose of Paris in the middle of 

 any bnt a wet summer without being forcibly taught how 

 advantageous it would be to be able to command water in 

 our gardens. It is the custom,, and a very frequent one^ 

 among the horticultural community, to grumble about 

 our climate — the " dull/^ " cloudy/-' " changeable^'' climate 

 of Britain ; to speak of that of other countries as paradisaical, 

 and to attribute all our failures to want of sun.^'' 



In 1868 we had sun enough to satisfy an Arab, and what 

 was the result ? The worst ever remembered in the garden. 

 It was natural to think the soft, green vegetables would suffer, 

 but everybody hoped the heat would prove favourable to 

 such useful members of the Solanum families as the Potato 

 and Tomato ; whereas the Potatoes proved worse than if 

 badly blighted, and even the heat-loving Tomato dropped 

 its flowers before setting. Radishes disappeared with the 

 dew of May. The Cabbage tribe presented, everywhere 

 that they had not completely perished, a sad spectacle — a 

 mere bony framework of glaucous vegetation, wdth all the 

 softer parts gnawed away by hungry tribes of vermin, the 

 only things that flourished with tiie heat. In this condition 

 the Brassicaceee were sold, and — the fact speaks well for the 

 appetite of the public — eaten. An extensive London market 

 gardener showed me a field of Celery with not a single plant 

 in it good or large enough to be culled for seasoning, and at 

 nearly every root grubs gnawing away the plant. Those who 

 are accustomed to realize hundreds of pounds for a crop, 

 gathered barely as much of it as would make it worth while 

 sending to the market ; while the private growers were quite 

 as badly off. During the month of July, and when Cauli- 

 flowers in British gardens had almost disappeared, I mea- 

 sured them in the market gardens of Paris a foot in diameter, 

 of that pure creamy white and perfectly dense and firm 

 texture which admirers of the Cauliflower like so much. 

 Strange as it may appear to some, during the whole of the 

 hot weather vegetables of the primest and the most delicate 

 quality were to be had in the Paris markets, where even 

 greater difficulties had to be met by the cultivator. 



