192 
HORTICULTURAL NOTES. 
oils, of which tin' seed is very full. Then, 
again, it has been hinted that the fibre of the 
stem is (it for mats or ropes, and other rough 
cordage. The Sunflower will grow well in 
rows, two feet apart in the row, and three 
feel between the rows : they may be sown the 
end of this month in heat, planted out in 
June, and will bloom and perfect their seeds 
admirably; but care must be taken to frighten 
away the birds as the seed begins to ripen, or 
the whole field would be cleared. The heads 
should be gathered as soon as the seed begins 
to colour, but the crown blooms will be ready 
long before any of those on the lateral shoots. 
It is a showy Howe)-, and used to be a favourite 
in large gardens. 
Potatoes — There is a new potato, called 
Thurston's Victoria, of which the most extra- 
ordinary stories are told as to its bearing. I 
do not doubt the facts, but I saw, I should 
think, two bushels taken from four potatoes 
once ; they may be said to have occupied in 
actual measurement a plot two feet in width 
and six feet in length ; and this was by the 
grower multiplied by as many such plots as 
there were in an acre, and it was given out at 
once that the said potato yielded so many 
tons to the acre ; but the four potatoes were 
taken infinite pains with, and the place all 
round them bore nothing, for it was robbed 
to earth them up, and the mere little plot 
which they occupied was no criterion of the 
space required ; that plot was all potatoes, 
and there was no fairness in estimating an 
acre equally filled, because it would be impos- 
sible to fill it. I do not say Thurston's Vic- 
toria depends on any such recommendation, 
but all stories about a thing yielding " at the 
rate of" should be read with caution. I con- 
sider any good new potato an acquisition, 
therefore mean not to discourage any. 
Cabbages. — Nothing is more common than 
making about two sowings do all that is re- 
quired of this universally approved and useful 
vegetable, and they are kept stunted in the 
seed-bed (or perhaps run to seed there) for 
the purpose of taking plants out whenever 
there is a place to fill up. Now I opine that 
no vegetable is better worth the trouble of 
growing well than a cabbage ; and for this 
purpose I recommend, as I practise, the sow- 
ing frequently, that the plants may be taken 
at their proper stages of growth for plantffig* 
out to cabbage. By frequent sowing, that is 
to say, once a month during the growing sea- 
son, and by pricking out into nursery beds as 
soon as the plant is large enough to handle, 
you can always contrive to keep plants that 
will answer the purpose of a short or pro- 
longed growth. The advantage may be felt 
another way: there is no complete failure, no 
quarter of the ground need be idle six weeks, 
because you are always ready to fill it with 
this excellent vegetable. As to the sorts I 
am almost indifferent ; I have planted for 
years only two sorts — the true early York and 
the Imperial — both are excellent, and if taken 
in season I do not know which is the better of 
the two. 
Curious Question. — Gentlemen's gar- 
deners are said to cut their employer's flowers 
and send them to Covent Garden market for 
their own gain ; and among those societies in 
which distinctions are made between dealers 
and amateurs, there is a disposition to call 
these gardeners dealers, and they are objected 
to. Among amateurs and gentlemen's gar- 
deners, who will not willingly show with 
them, the question mooted is, whether the 
supply of cut flowers to sell at market con- 
stitutes a dealer in flowers, and if it does so, 
whether they have any right to show in a 
class from which dealers are excluded. On 
the one part it is held that trading in cut 
flowers is not trading in the sense contem- 
plated by the laws of such societies; and a 
declaration from the societies themselves can 
alone settle this matter. The real issue can 
only be settled one way, but the superficial 
question may be decided any how by the 
societies, one of whom may decide that flower- 
sellers are dealers, and one that flower-sellers 
are not dealers. It is certain that the trade 
in cut flowers as now cai'ried on is a new one, 
and I should like to have your notions. — D. D. 
[We think it one of those cases that must be 
settled by the committees themselves; we must 
otherwise take the common-sense view of the 
case, and say that dealers are dealers.] 
The Cutting of Asparagus. — Although 
much has been said upon the proper mode of 
cutting asparagus, I fear it has been lost from 
its having appeared among common directions, 
from which all men who know their business, 
and all those who think they know it, turn 
without reading. Now it is really worth a 
gardener's consideration to send up asparagus 
to his employer's table in first-rate order, 
rather than in first-rate style ; and he can 
only accomplish this by getting the cook on 
his side, and inducing him or her to send up 
two dishes, one with the usual purple knobs 
at the end of white finger-looking buds, and 
the-ether three inches of green eatable vege- 
table, with hardly an inch of the white, hard, 
uneatable stuff upon it. The one is cut as 
soon as the knob is fairly through the ground ; 
the other is allowed to get two or three inches 
fairly through the soil. Employers would soon 
discover which sort they liked best, for there 
never was such a mistake as that of consider- 
ing asparagus in perfection before there was 
a good three inches of eatable vegetable at- 
tached to them. — B. 31. 
