The Vegetable Supply of a Large Town. 
875 
or to the agent, and the cart or waggon is ready for its return journey. 
Early in the morning the patron draws or cuts the vegetables for 
the next day's sale, and prepares them for market ; general work in 
the garden keeps the other hands employed in the afternoon. 
Farther away from Paris the gardens are distinguished from 
those of the Seine by their greater extent, and by the use of the 
plough rather than of the spade ; the produce which is raised, more- 
over, is rarely cultivated under glass, and comprises nearly all the 
culinary vegetables, with certain specialities determined by the 
nature of the soil and the situation. It may be generally stated 
that the suburban cultivator works about three hectares (say seven 
acres) of land, and obtains therefrom a gross annual income of 10,000 
francs. Peas, French beans, asparagus, chicory, carrots, onions, 
turnips, early potatoes, dandelions, and winter salsify are the prin- 
cipal products within a radius of half a dozen to a score of miles 
around Paris. Conveyed in by road, the produce is deposited along- 
side the markets, the municipality imposing a tax for the space 
which is thus required. The hours of sale for these suburban cul- 
tivators begin and end an hour later than the corresponding times 
in the case of the Paris market gardeners. 
The third class of producers, who reach Paris by rail, are the 
small market-garden proprietors of the Ile-de-France, the Boulon- 
nais, and Brittany, but especially of Provence and Languedoc. 
Some are even as far away as Algeria, Andalusia, and Milan. The 
quantities of garden produce carried into Paris by the five great 
railway companies are very unequal. For last year the weights 
were (1 kilogramme = 2 - 2 lb.)— 
Railway Kilogrammes 
Compagnie de Paris-Lyon-Mediterranee . . 20,593,412 
,, Paris-Orleans .... 2,676,556 
„ lOuest . . . . . 5,072,334 
l'Est 175,218 
,, du Nord 1,460,802 
29,978,322 
The Western Railway (de l'Ouest) runs through some important 
market-garden districts — Limay, Louviers, Elbeuf, the coast of Cal- 
vados, Anjou. But the region which more especially furnishes 
Paris with its supply of winter vegetables, including cabbage and 
cauliflower, is the part of Brittany between Brest and Cherbourg, 
washed by the tepid waters of the Gulf Stream. In the south, 
special mention should be made of the Departments of Vaucluse, 
Var, Bouches-du-Rhone, and Alpes Maritimes. 
The Compagnie d'Orle'ans, in conjunction with the Compagnie de 
Lyon, carries to Paris the consignments from Perpignan and the 
importations from Spain. All the railway companies, but these in 
particular, receive fresh vegetables and transport them to Paris with 
remarkable care and promptitude. They are there delivered to 
agents who generally carry them to the markets, or they are sold 
by auction. 
