518 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER * 
April 30 , 
CELERY FOR FAMILY USE. 
Many people think the culture of 
celery is so difficult that they do not 
try to grow it. I wish to tell how a 
few hundred plants of celery of rich 
nutty flavor, tender and crisp, can be 
easily grown on a square rod of ordi¬ 
nary garden soil. Black muck or rich 
loam is not necessary to grow good 
celery, with the method I will describe, 
but any soil that will grow good corn 
and potatoes. 
For Fall and early Winter, grow 
Golden Self Blanching. For the celery 
that will be ready for use in September, 
sow the seed out of doors as soon as 
the soil can be worked in the Spring. 
In a corner of the garden where the 
soil is a rich mellow loam, rake off 
the surface very fine, as for an onion 
bed. Mark a few straight rows about 
one inch deep, and sow the seed rather 
thickly by hand. When the soil is dry 
walk over the rows, pressing it firmly 
over the seed. This is all the covering 
needed. Cut some cloth—burlap or 
sacking is good—in narrow strips, and 
lay over the seed. Water enough to 
keep the soil moist all the time until 
the seeds germinate, then take off the 
cloth. If the sun shines hot shade the 
or lawn, in the 18-inch space between 
the rows, and pour sufficient water over 
this mulch to keep the soil moist all 
the time. This is a good use for the 
wastes from the house. It takes but 
little water to irrigate plants when the 
surface of the soil is covered with a 
mulch, as there is no evaporation, and 
the surface of the soil does not bake. 
This plan of mulching and watering 
furnishes a moist cool place for the roots 
of the celery—which is essential for 
growing the best celery—which is gen¬ 
erally obtained by handling and banking 
the plants. 
Next set up the blanching boards, 
which may be 12 to 16 inches wide. 
Set the boards so the plants are boarded 
in double rows, i. e., the rows that are 
12 inches apart are boarded together, 
with the two rows between the boards, 
so 'saving one-half the boards used for 
boarding the rows singly. Support the 
boards by stakes and braces, and keep 
them well apart until the plants grow 
above them. Growing in a dark space 
causes celery to blanch, and the blanch¬ 
ing begins so soon after the boards are 
set up. When the celery has grown a 
few inches above the boards, and it is 
wanted for use, crowd the boards close 
A GARDEN CROP OF CELERY. 
seedlings for three or four days. Thin 
the plants so they will grow stocky, and 
stir the soil around them to keep them 
growing and water sufficiently to keep 
the soil moist. The last of May or first 
of June and July the plants may be 
transplanted to the plant bed, where the 
celery is to be grown. Plants two 
inches high, if stocky, are much better 
than tall, weak, spindling plants. Plants 
grown under glass and not well hard¬ 
ened are not as desirable as those grown 
as I have described. 
Now we are ready for the plant-bed. 
Cover a plot of fairly good soil with 
good stable manure, if you can get it. 
Commercial fertilizers will get fair re¬ 
sults if one knows how to use them. 
Spade or plow in the manure and mix 
it well with the soil. Rake down the 
surface very fine and draw a garden 
line across one side. With the line set 
rows of plants 12 inches apart, taking 
care to put the roots straight down, 
using a dibber if needed, and setting 
the bottom of the stem just even with 
the surface of the ground, and firm the 
soil around the plants, so it cannot be 
pulled out without breaking the stem. 
Move the line 18 inches and set two 
more rows the same way. Set the plants 
on a level with the ground. Make no 
trenches for them. Plant so as to 
have the rows alternate distances of 12 
and 18 inches apart, and six inches in 
row. Begin to cultivate with wheel and 
hand cultivators soon after planting, and 
when the plants are six to eight inches 
high, place a mulch of coarse strawy 
manure, if this is not at hand, refuse 
vines, weeds, or grass from the garden 
together, which completes the blanch¬ 
ing in a few days. 
For late Winter celery, plant the non¬ 
self-blanching green varieties, as Giant 
Pascal, in rows 2 % feet apart, and do 
not try to blanch it out of doors, but 
late in Fall dig it and plant the roots 
in moist soil, between rows of boards, 
on the cellar bottom. No better celery 
can be grown by any method than I 
have grown by the method described, 
and I write from a long experience of 
growing many thousand celery plants 
for home use and market. 
New York. w. h. jenkins. 
Bamboos. —That picture and account 
of the Louisiana bamboo grove leads 
me to say that it has always been a 
wonder to me that the more hardy 
bamboos are not seen more frequently 
northward. Some of the more dwarf 
forms are planted, and one can see 
clumps of the Bambusa Metake in the 
lawns in Philadelphia. But there are 
others that are of a taller and prettier 
shape than Metake that are fully as 
hardy. Some years ago there were 
large clumps of shrubbery and other 
things planted on the grounds of the 
Governor’s mansion in the city of 
Raleigh, N. C. Among these was a 
beautiful species of bamboo, the name 
of which I have never learned. From 
these plants a large plot was planted on 
the Capitol Square in Raleigh, and I 
planted some roots on my grounds 
there. Mine, in a hard, dry clay soil, 
grew 15 to 20 feet tall, as also have 
the plants on the Capitol Square. 
Propagated in the Biltmore nursery, 
where the Winter temperature goes as 
low at times as in New York, this bam¬ 
boo should be hardy pretty well North, 
and I shall get some of the roots to 
plant in Maryland. The stems of this 
species are golden yellow, and the foli¬ 
age is fine and pale green and not dark 
iike Metake. I never saw the foliage 
singed by the coldest weather in Ra¬ 
leigh. w. F. MASSEY. 
“Briar Wood" Pipes. —Several years 
ago I was lecturing at a farmers’ in¬ 
stitute in the remote town of Boone, in 
the valley back of the great Grandfather 
Mountain in North Carolina, and 
found there an industry that may give 
some enlightenment on the subject of 
“French” briar wood pipes. In a little 
mill there I saw a long row of French¬ 
men each with a jig-saw before him 
sawing out the rough forms of pipes 
from the roots of the Kalmia latifolia. 
There was a great heap of the immense 
roots there which the mountain people 
had brought in to the mill, great knot¬ 
ty things as large as a nail keg. These 
were sawn off in flitches and these 
flitches were taken by the operators 
and cut as many pipe forms as each 
piece would make. These blocks were 
then soaked in a red dye, and packed 
in barrels and sent -to New York to 
be finished up into “French” briar 
pipes. A year or more before the es¬ 
tablishment of this mill a letter was 
received from a firm in France by the 
State Department of Agriculture ask¬ 
ing if a supply of the Kalmia roots or 
“Bruyere” wood could be had there, 
and they were told that it was very 
plentiful. The pipe forms at this little 
mill were all soaked in boiling dye be¬ 
fore shipment. w. f. massey. 
Plural Voting. —In Belgium and, we 
think, in several other European countries, 
voting is done under a system which gives 
some citizens several votes. The clergy 
have extra votes, and so do certain of the 
“nobility” or royal family. There are also 
extra votes given to property holders. 
U. S. Consul Deedmeyer, of Charlottetown, 
Prince Edward Island, describes the plural 
system operating in that city: 
“In elections of mayor and councilors 
(aldermen) for the city of Charlottetown 
all men and all unmarried women above 
the age of 21 years, having paid prior to 
the time of holding any such election all 
rates, taxes, and assessments then due, 
have a right to give one or more votes. The 
franchise is limited to those possessing a 
freehold estate of $100 assessed value or 
over; to renters of real estate of a yearly 
rental value of $14; to payers of an an¬ 
nual income tax of $2 and upward, and to 
those who pay a poll tax of $2 each year. 
Non-residents, owners or lessees of real 
estate in the city, may vote at these elec¬ 
tions. A voter thus qualified, may vote in 
the ward in which he or she resides and 
also in every other ward in which he or 
she owns or occupies real estate. Under 
this provision an elector, residing in one 
ward of the city and owning real estate 
or being in possession of premises for busi¬ 
ness purposes in the other four wards of 
the city, may vote five times at the same 
election, once in each ward, and he or she 
votes in each ward for one of the candi¬ 
dates for mayor and for the number of 
councilors to be elected from such ward.” 
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