28 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



make all the difference between success and failure with certain 

 crops in naturally poor or ungenial soils. 



And now we come to the least in bulk of all the essentials 

 for healthy crops, but of the greatest importance — fresh, strong, 

 well-fed seed. This can only be produced from plants grown 

 specially for seed, in the best of soil, well stored with the 

 ingredients for perfecting it. Weak pods of Peas from starved 

 plants — and it is the same with everything else— represent 

 degeneration. I have seen crops from seed of the same varieties 

 of vegetables, sown at the same time, side by side, one weak 

 and the ether strong, one unprofitable and the other profitable, 

 one to which the grower pointed with pride, the other with 

 annoyance. The difference was due to the seed, and the seed 

 alone. Let this be of the best, the soil be in the best mechanical 

 condition, and stored with manure containing the elements of 

 nutrition, and the best of vegetables will be produced. It is not 

 necessary to have fanciful mixtures for every crop, nor does it 

 follow that lavish applications produce corresponding results. 

 While sufficient should be provided, more than enough is waste, 

 for, as Dr. Masters says in "Plant Life," "particular species 

 take what they want and take it when they want it, not being 

 induced to take more by the addition of larger supplies." 



Just another sentence or two. Quick-acting nitrogenous 

 manures, such as nitrate of soda and sulphate of ammonia (the 

 former for light and dry, the latter for heavy and cold soils), 

 should be applied at the rate of H to 2 cwts. per acre, or f oz. 

 to the square yard, early in the season to growing crops, never 

 late in the autumn ; phosphatic and potassic manures in thrice 

 the quantity earlier still, before growth commences and before 

 dry weather sets in, or they cannot be appropriated by, because 

 not dissolved in time for, the crops they are intended to support. 

 Chemical manures have often been condemned as worthless, 

 when the fault rested with the users in simply applying what 

 was really »ood at the wrong time for attaining the object in 

 view. 



It is scarcely necessary to dwell on the value of liquid manure 

 in summer, but it may be stated that, instead of the drainings 

 from manure heaps, and the contents of cesspools, being wasted 

 in winter, as is not uncommon, they should on suitable occasions 

 be poured on vacant (drained) land ; the virtues of the liquid will 



