210 
FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY 
the winter of 1913-14, a number of cars 
were precooled and shipped when the 
temperature was so ; low that it did not 
seem as though precooling could be of 
much benefit. Yet even in these cases 
some effect in improving the carrying 
quality of the lettuce could be seen. At 
times when the temperature at the ship¬ 
ping point is above the average and when 
lettuce drop is especially prevalent the 
effect of both careful cutting and of pre¬ 
cooling would undoubtedly be consider¬ 
ably greater than is shown in the average 
of these experiments. 
The special method of cutting lettuce 
described above could probably be 
adopted on a commercial scale without 
serious difficulty. Removing the heads 
in such a way as to leave the bottom 
leaves attached to the roots requires a 
somewhat longer time than the ordinary 
method of cutting, and discarding these 
bottom leaves means a slight reduction 
in the total quantity of lettuce harvested, 
although this loss in quantity is by no 
means great when the heads are of fairly 
large size. Neither of the objections 
mentioned is of much importance wnen 
the improved keeping quality of the 
carefully cut lettuce is considered. 
