ASPARAGUS. 



13 



the finest shoots and leave all else to grow naturally, and one 

 result was an abundant green growth in the early days of May, 

 when the visitor unaccustomed to the business might remark that 

 the Asparagus was going to ruin through being allowed to have 

 its own way so out of time and season. But when that happened, 

 I would take a basket and in a few minutes cut half a hundred 

 handsome heads as thick as a man's thumb — and thicker than 

 a man's thumb Asparagus should not be — and with a great 

 depth of green, and this when cooked was eatable half the way 

 down, and of the finest flavour possible for Asparagus. 



When I began this business I did not anticipate or aim at 

 what really happened. But I found that in a fairly good season, 

 with rain enough, and the plant having its own way from the 

 first, except that it was tenderly robbed of a few of its best 

 shoots occasionally, those best shoots were presented in suc- 

 cession, and often in great plenty during August and September, 

 and I have gathered a supply in October, although that, it should 

 be observed, was an exceptional case. 



If you say you do not want Asparagus in August and Sep- 

 tember, I have no reply. So far as that goes you need not heed 

 a word I say. But probably there are some confiding ones in 

 the world who will believe me when I say that Asparagus with 

 partridges is a most happy combination ; it is like a mixture 

 of silver and gold, for these two delicacies belong to the precious 

 metals of gastronomy. But I wanted Asparagus of fine quality 

 in great plenty and through as long a season as possible, for 

 what reason I need not declare, for I am here to talk of possibilities 

 in horticulture, and not of my private affairs. It is enough to 

 say that I made a fine plant on clay land of a forbidding nature, 

 and, by treating the plant generously, it repaid me beyond all 

 hope or expectation. 



It is customary to see in English gardens Asparagus beds that 

 never have and never can pay a reasonable rent for the ground 

 they cover. Usually the seed is sown too thickly in the first 

 instance, and is never after sufficiently thinned. Beginning in 

 this bad way the case is soon made worse by the appearance of 

 additional plants from self-sown seeds, and thus we have a crowd 

 fighting for food with the usual result of a puny, unprofitable 

 growth. The practice of cutting all that rises until the end of 

 June completes the system of how not to do it, and many who 



