THE CULINARY GARDEN. 



37 



It is necessary that all soils should be kept open by artificial 

 means, for the purpose of admitting a sufficient quantity of 

 warmth to the roots of plants. All earths are bad conductors, 

 and therefore it would be long before the rays of heat could 

 penetrate to a sufficient depth, particularly in spring, to be of 

 much importance to the roots of vegetables, unless, indeed, the 

 soil is, by frequent turning, rendered capable of admitting a 

 free ingress of the warmth, both of the sun's rays and of tepid 

 rains. 



Open soils are also necessary for the effecting of those 

 changes, which all manures have to undergo, before they are in 

 a proper state for food to vegetables. Animal and vegetable 

 substances, when exposed to the action of light, air, and water 

 undergo spontaneous decomposition, which would not other- 

 wise take place, and by that process they are properly prepared 

 for the nourishment of vegetables. 



The improvement of soils by pulverization, that is, by the 

 operations of trenching, digging, hoeing, and stirring, we con- 

 sider to be important, but we must not entertain the idea, that 

 the proper management of the land consists in the adoption of 

 that principle only; for, in the strictest sense of the word, 

 pulverization is of no other benefit to the plants which grow in 

 the soil, than that it increases the number of their fibrous 

 roots or mouths, by which they imbibe their food, thereby 

 facilitating the more perfect preparation of that food, and con- 

 ducting it so prepared more regularly to their roots. Ground 

 should never, for any length of time, lie uncultivated, or with- 

 out being cropped, unless for the purpose of giving it rest ; and 

 in that case, as soon as the crop is cleared off, all the refiise, 

 which is left on the ground, should immediately be dug in ; 

 this would not only have a tendency to improve the ground, 

 but would give the garden always a more neat and orderly ap- 

 pearance, and a considerable degree of labor would be thereby 

 economised in the destruction of weeds. The time which it 

 would take to hoe, rake, and clear off the rubbish of a quar- 

 ter of the garden, when the crops are removed, will be almost 

 equal to that, which it would take to dig it over ; and, in some 

 cases, more time would be occupied, independently of the loss 

 of the vegetable matter raked off, and which is cai'ried ofl 



