THE FLORAL WORLD AND GARDEN GUIDE. 
29 
and when slightly trodden must be covered with boards to shut in 
the heat and keep out the cold and wet. Finally, the beds should 
be covered with six inches depth of the same hot dung. In a mild 
winter the routine may be modified with a view to economy ; and, 
as the season advances, the amount of heating material required to 
start a bed will become less and less. 
A better quality of forced asparagus, less fat, but green, and 
therefore tender, and with the welcome flavour of a good sample, 
may be obtained by taking up the plants and forcing them in pits 
and frames. It is a very simple business. The plants should be 
taken from beds three or four years old, and planted in light soil on 
well-made hotbeds, or beds heated by hot-water pipes. A gentle 
heat suffices, and indeed the slower the forcing the better the pro- 
duce. As the glass protects the plant from frost, it may enjoy light 
and air, except when the weather is severe, and therefore need not 
be much moulded up, the object being to obtain short, plump, dark- 
green shoots of the mostjtender and richly-flavoured kind, fit to “set 
before a king.’’ A large, deep bed of leaves, with a sufficiency of 
old lights and walls of turf, or loose bricks, or stout boards set on 
edge with pegs to hold them, afford machinery enough for the pro- 
duction of the finest forced asparagus, provided only there is a 
strong plantation of some years’ standing to begin with for the 
supply of stools for the purpose. 
PLANTS TOUCHED WITH FROST. 
ATEYER is touched with frost keep dark and cool, 
and damage will be lessened, if not entirely obviated. 
The effect of frost on plants depends considerably on 
the state it finds them in. Soft-wooded greenhouse 
plants are killed instanter if they are in a moist atmo- 
sphere and growing temperature with full enjoyment of light ; but 
if moderately dry, and well covered so as to be almost in total dark- 
ness, very many even of the tenderest will bear a few degrees with 
impunity. This advice may be of use now, for we may have a smart 
time of it yet, before the cowslips blossom. If frost gets into a house, 
and makes its mark on the minimum thermometer, draw down the 
blind, if you have one, at once, or cover the lights with tarpaulin, 
straw, or whatever may be at hand to exclude the light, and be par- 
ticularly careful not to get up the heat in a hurry. To raise the 
temperature is, of course, essential, but it will be well to keep it 
at about 33° for a day at least, that thawing may take place slowly. 
A few degrees of frost met in this way will do much less harm than 
is generally inflicted where the terrified cultivator heaps on the fuel, 
in the mistaken notion that fire is the proper antidote to freezing. 
The same remark holds good as to fruit. The frost gets into part 
of the store of apples and pears, and some are frozen hard. If they 
are allowed to thaw slowly, and in the dark, they are not a whit the 
worse for the visitation. If thawed in full daylight, they would 
probably melt in the operation. 
January. 
