Gardening- for Profit. 
Two or three years since, a lady living 
within a few miles of one of our great 
business centers, finding much difficulty in 
procuring fresh vegetables during the Sum¬ 
mer season, determined to raise them her¬ 
self. The farmers in her vicinity carried 
their vegetables directly to the city market, 
where her grocer bought them, and she got 
them after they had been transported twice 
over the road, and had had time enough, in 
addition to that, to loose all their freshness 
while lying in the market and the grocery. 
She determined to rent an acre of land, 
hire a stout Irishman to plow and plant it 
for her, get him one day in every week to 
do the heavy work, and all the rest she 
would do herself. Everybody discouraged 
her in the undertaking. She was entirely 
unaccustomed to such work, knew nothing 
of gardening, and was moreover a lady, 
which was the hardest argument of all to 
meet. But in spite of the incredulous 
smiles of her friends and the expostula¬ 
tions of her husband, who was in easy cir¬ 
cumstances, she adhered to her resolution. 
An acre of land was rented, and a man 
hired to prepare and plant it, she aiding 
him in the work, dropping potatoes while 
he covered them, planting peas, putting 
out onion sets and cabbage plants, and 
learning in a general and specific way un¬ 
der his tutelage how to cultivate them. 
The housework was left mainly in the 
hands of a competent and faithful hired 
assistant, and every day for several hours 
she gave herself to gardening. It was 
hard work; the July sun was hot and 
scorching, the rows of corn and potatoes 
were long and wearisome, but she was su¬ 
perior to fatigue and strong in resolution. 
A rigid account was kept with this acre of 
ground, and she knew to a farthing all her 
receipts and expenditures. In the fall 
when she balanced the accounts she found 
that in addition to having all the fresh veg¬ 
etables she could use in the family during 
the Summer, she had in store an ample 
supply for Winter consumption, and had 
sold enough to pay all expenses of labor, 
tools, and seeds, and had realized $100 cash 
as clear profit. Her cow, meantime, had 
lived largely from the garden, and thus 
even the refuse vegetables had been trans¬ 
formed into milk for the children. 
But these were the least valuable of her 
out-of-door industry. Her three children 
were nervous fragile creatures, and one of 
them, put to sleep in its crib to all appear¬ 
ance in perfect health, was found dead and 
cold an hour or two afterward, in the same 
position it had been laid to rest. Late in 
the Autumn which succeeded her labors in 
the open air there came to her arms a 
healthful, vigorous baby boy, totally un¬ 
like the feeble offspring that had hitherto 
given her so much pleasure and pain. The 
child grew and, waxed strong, passing 
through the different stages of babyhood 
into robust and chubby childhood without 
illness or suffering, and when a few weeks 
since, the mother rehearsed this story he 
had known scarcely a sick day from his 
birth. When her experiments in horticul¬ 
ture are referred to, she points with pride 
and delight to him as the prime stimulus to 
her enterprise and crowning proof that her 
Gardening was for Profit. 
—Practical Farmer 
Poultry Manure. 
Poultry manure is by far the most valu¬ 
able fertilizer produced on farms. Fowls 
eat concentrated food that is rich in nitro¬ 
gen and phosphorus, and their droppings 
partake of the nature of the food they de¬ 
vour. Grain, the seeds of small plants, 
meat, and insects produce, when decompos¬ 
ed by the action of the digestive apparatus, 
richer fertilizing material than grass, hay, 
and straw. Besides, birds void their urine 
in a solid form and combined with the ex¬ 
crement that is usually solid. As a conse¬ 
quence it is not liable to be wasted if the 
manure is rightly cared for. Poultry ma¬ 
nure is about as valuable as the best Peru¬ 
vian guano. To make it of the highest val¬ 
ue as a fertilizer, however, it must be stored 
and applied to the ground with care, Ex¬ 
posed to the weather it will be dissolved by 
rain and carried off. Placed in large heaps 
it heats and the ammonia is driven off and 
