THE AMATEUR’S KITCHEN GARDEN. 257 
house, and so on, allowing a week at least between every 
remove. When taken into the house in which they are to 
fruit the pots should be stood on troughs or pans or beds of 
rich soil ; indeed, fat fresh stuff from the cow byre or sheep' 
fold will suit them, and they will soon send out roots through 
the pots to enjoy the banquet. The secret at first is to 
secure early roots, the secret at last is to feed the roots 
liberally. If a batch of forced strawberries should be short of 
moisture for one day, the fruit would drop or prove of the 
poorest quality, and the same sad end would follow if they 1 
were put into a high temperature too suddenly, or if, in his 
anxiety for early fruit the cultivator should forget to give 
them a reasonable supply of air. The slower the "forcing "the 
better, and in a domestic garden, the middle of January 
is soon enough to begin. At all events a hundred plants ‘ 
started in the middle of January will, as a rule, give five 
times more fruit than the same number started in the middle 
of December, to say nothing of the superior colour and flavour 
of the later grown samples. 
Strawberries at Christmas are desired in some extra- 
vagant households. The best way to secure them is to follow 
the plan of the gardeners of Copenhagen, where it is the 
custom to present friends with ripe strawberries on Christmas 
Day. The system adopted is to sow the seed of the alpine 
strawberries in July and August, and by securing strong plants 
in pots in good time, to force them slowly in pits with low 
pitched roofs. 
The Cool Culture op British Queen and other first- 
class sorts to ensure large handsome well flavoured berries 
about a month or six weeks in advance of the open ground crop 
should be carried on with the aid of troughs, which afford the 
plants more food than it is possible for them to obtain in pots 
by any method of watering or encouraging them to root 
through.. The troughs should be eight inches deep, seven 
inches wide at top, and five inches wide at bottom, with holes 
at the bottom to let off surplus water. The plants should be 
grown in pots in the usual way, and in October should be 
well established in six-inch pots with plump well ripened 
crowns. Having had a rest in a cool pit, and allowed to go 
nearly dry, they should be taken into a house at a tempera- 
ture of 50 degs. and allowed to slowly start into new growth. 
As soon as the buds are visible they are planted in the troughs, 
