194 
THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE OF AMERICA 
be watered. For a fall crop, seed should be sown as near 
jMay 25 as possible. Kronk's Perfection Erfurt for early, 
Dry Weather and Snowball for late, are splendid vari- 
eties to grow. Brussels Sprouts should be sown as soon 
as the ground is open, and later planted out in rows three 
feet apart and two feet between the plants. These are 
splendid and choice winter vegetables ; with the cab- 
bages they should be lifted and heeled in a cool cellar 
before the frost becomes too severe. Aigburth is a first- 
class sort ; so is Dobbie's Selected. Savoy cabbage is pre- 
ferred by some to the common cabbage ; the culture is 
the same, and the Drumhead variety the best. Green 
curled kale or borecole is a very hardy member of the 
Brassica family, and of very easy culture ; heeled in with 
the cabbages it can be used from February to the last of 
April, and is superior to the greens brought from the 
South. It should not be housed until it has had several 
good freezings. 
No garden is complete without tomatoes. These are 
easily raised in the house or cold frame, and if strong 
plants are set out, fruit may be picked by the middle of 
July and until killing frost. To secure good tomatoes 
they should not be allowed to ramble over the ground at 
liberty, but trained to stakes, fences, or some other sup- 
port. We prefer to retain two of the bottom laterals, with 
the main stems, and to rub oiif all other laterals, also 
cutting back some of the leaves, especially when the 
plants are tied up to stakes. Trained plants have many 
ad\'antages to compensate us for the care bestowed upon 
them, the fruit is always clean, and readily seen when 
wanted, ripens better, and has a superior flavor to those 
borne on plants which are bespattered with soil after 
every rainfall. Excellent early tomatoes are Chalk's 
Early Jewel and Lister's Prolific. For a main crop, 
nothing is superior to the old reliable Stone. Aristocrat 
and Dwarf Stone are fine dwarf types, excellent for very 
small gardens. Golden Queen is the finest of the large yel- 
low varieties. The small fruited tomatoes have of late 
years come greatly to the fore : for salads, decorative ef- 
fects and preserving they are very fine : the finest of these 
is Yellow Plum : others to be recommended are Red Cher- 
ry, Peach, Pear and Red Plum. 
An important crop is sweet corn ; no vegetal^le will 
withstand severe drought and heat better if persistent cul- 
ture is given the crop. It succeeds well in either hills or 
drills, probably in the latter the stalks will not blow over 
so much during the wet windy weather. The first sowing 
can be made in a warm piece of ground from April 15 to 
April 20; even if it is cut down by a late frost, the seed 
is easily sown again, and the loss is but trifling. The 
soil for sweet corn should l3e very rich for best results. 
Seeds can be sown at intervals of from eight to ten days 
until July 1, in the case of Stowell's Evergreen, and a few 
days later with Crosby. We have sown early varieties as 
late as July 15, and they have yielded an abundant supply 
of crops when frost held off late. In the way of early 
varieties. First Crop Sugar, Golden Bantam, Early Cory, 
and Peep-o-day, are all good. In medium earlies we have 
Golden Dawn, an excellent yellow variety of fine flavor, 
and the always reliable Crosby : Porter's Excellent is an- 
other sort of excellent flavor; of late varieties, Stowell's 
Evergreen produces the largest cobs, and they are very 
tender and sweet, but Country Gentleman, an irregular 
road variety, has a very delicate flavor. 
Celerv is a very imnortant vegetable for fall and winter 
use. It will grow well on level ground, and is thus plant- 
ed bv market growers ; but in trenches, it makes its finest 
possible growth. Advantages of trench culture are that 
water is more easily applied, the- plants are more readily 
hilled up, and the trenches give shade to the plants in hot 
weather. An abundance of well rotted manure should be 
placed in the trenches, as celery is a gross feeder. Golden 
Self Blanching is the finest early variety ; Golden Rose is 
also good; White Plum is handsome, but of coarse tex- 
ture. Good winter sorts are White Queen, (jiant Pascal, 
and Boston Market. The richest and most mellow soils 
should be used for celery culture. Early varieties may be 
bleached by means of boards, but the latter sorts must be 
hilled up by degrees, and housed in a cool, frost-proof 
cellar before weather becomes too severe. It must also 
be aired on all favorable occasions. In lifting celery the 
earth should be moist ; if not, apply some water after 
planting in the frame or cellar, and always take a nice 
ball of earth with each plant. 
Onions are one of the most popular vegetables, and it 
is not difficult for the small grower to produce an all-the- 
year-round supply on a small piece of ground. The 
ground can hardly be made too rich ; cow manure, with 
some soot added, is extra good as a fertilizer. The 
ground must be prepared, and the seed planted just as 
soon as possible after the frost has left the ground, and 
it has sufficiently dried out. For the earliest crop, plant 
small sets ; we prefer the yellow ones, four inches apart in 
the rows. Very small sets are the best ; those from one- 
third of an inch in diaiueter upw'ards will largely run to 
seed. We like to roll or tramp the onion ground before 
drawing the drills, which can be twelve inches apart, 
giving another tramp after covering the drills. Just as 
soon as the seed is sown, start cultivating, and keep at it 
constantly until the tops are so much grown as to pre- 
vent it ; also weed the rows carefully, especially after a 
rain, when they will pull u\) most easily. It is no use 
planting this crop unless this matter of weeding is relig- 
iously attended to. 
The so-called new onion culture is reall_\- a very old 
practice, and was in vogue in Great Britain half a cen- 
tury or more ago. It consists of sowing seeds in flats or 
in a cold frame late in February, or early in March, and 
transplanting the seedlings in well-prepared ground about 
April 15. A/'ery large Inilbs are secured in this way, fine 
for exhilMtion. but they will not keep well ; in fact, very 
few are sound after Christmas, and this mode of culture 
is not to be recommended where onions are wanted 
through the whole winter. For this method of culture, 
Ailsa Craig and Prize Taker are e.xcellent. For sowing 
outdoors, Danvers Yellow is the onion par excellence ; 
Prize Taker, Australian Brown, and Red \\'ethersfield 
are all good. 
Spinach of the round-leaved type is of course indis- 
pensable, and for summer use nothing beats the \ew 
Zealand variety. This must not be planted before ]\Iay 
10, however, ^^'ith this latter vegetable, and a small row 
of Swiss chard, it is possible for a large famih' to secure 
a constant cut of greens for at least four months in the 
year. 
I have not mentioned salad plants : of these, lettuce is 
the most valuable, and by starting seed in the house or 
cold-frame, and making successional sowings outdoors 
from the end of ^larch until the middle of .\ugust, heads 
may be cut from the early part of ]\Iav until the end of 
November. For the earliest sowing. White Seeded Ten- 
nis Ball and Big Boston are leaders : for later sowings. 
May King, Deacon, Black Seeded Tennis Ball, and Sut- 
ton's Standwell are reliable. The Romaine or Cos Let- 
tuce is popular with many ; Trianon is a good self-bleach- 
ing sort. Endive is an excellent and handsome salad 
plant when A\-ell bleached: the plants want more severe 
thinninc tlian lettuce, and to lileach them, the outer leaves 
should be gathered to a point and tied with raffia. En- 
dive can be kept in the cellar, packed in dr\- sand, through 
a good part of the winter. Green Curled and Batavian 
are splendid sorts. 
