On Cottcuje Gardeninrj. 



339 



to be regretted that there are so few competitors, owing entirely 

 to the want of gardens among that useful class of men. 



To the foregoing directions and remarks may now be added a 

 few general rules, of which no cultivator of a garden should be 

 ignorant, as success depends on circumstances which are often 

 unheeded or neglected : — 



First. Never work the soil, either by spade or hoe, if heavy and 

 drenched with rain, for if moved in that state it naturally settles 

 down too closely together again, and remains in the worst con- 

 dition for encouraging the spread of roots. Soil cannot be too 

 dry for working ; and moving it in dry weather causes it to attract 

 moisture from the air. 



Second. Always sow in time and upon freshly-stirred soil, and 

 while it is loose and moderately moist. Some seeds, as the com- 

 mon bean and onion, affect a firm bed to strike root in, and con- 

 sequently the first are best dibbed, and the last trodden into the 

 soil. 



Third. Always plant in newly-digged ground unless the surface 

 be already occupied with a crop shortly to be cleared off, in 

 which case strong plants of a succeeding crop may be profitably 

 introduced. 



Fourth, Destroy weeds before they come into flower ; and vrhen 

 any kind of earth or rank herbage of grass or weeds is collected 

 for the compost heap, see that the whole is well fermented, and 

 turned once or twice to kill the seeds of weeds, or promote their 

 germination before the compost is used in the garden. 



Fifth. jN ever allow a single square yard to remain vacant dur- 

 ing the growino- season : and that this may never be, the cottager 

 should alwavs have seed-beds of lettuce, and particularlv cabbage 

 or some one or other of the cabbage tribe, to supply plants for 

 both regular and irregular cropping. 



Althoug-h the cottao-er mav amuse him.self bv cultivatinof a 

 greater variety of eatable vegetables than we have mentioned, he 

 must not neglect the more useful kinds, for they require unceas- 

 ing attention. He may, to be sure, grow cucumbers and pump- 

 kins ; the first are always an agreeable relish to the bacon in 

 warm weather ; and the second make an excellent family pie or 

 pudding in autumn, mixed with v»ildings or crabs gathered from 

 the hedges. 



A labourer may grow cucumbers plentifully in the smiplest 

 way : about the beginning of ]May he digs a pit 3 feet square, on 

 a border lying well to the sun, making it 1 foot deep, and laying 

 the broken earth round the sides: this pit he fills with any rank 

 growing weeds, nettles, flags, or long grass, from the sides of 

 ditches ; let these v> eeds be somewhat withered before they are 

 shaken and trodden into the pit ; the weeds are then covered with 



