302 
CULTURE OF PEAS. 
as the best fruit is generally on the extremity. All shoots that push 
out in summer from wood of three or four years’ growth, I displace 
immediately, as they are glutinous and unfruitful. From April to 
the end of May, I cover the trees on the wall at night with canvass 
and bass mats, as several of the fruit at that time are as large as 
Mazagan beans, and the slightest frost would destroy them. During 
the summer months, I give them plenty of water over the leaves with 
the engine, thrice a week. Young healthy trees are liable to make 
a great length of young wood ; when that is the case the sap flows too 
rapidly past the fruit, which thus starves and drops off. This may 
he prevented, if observed in time. In the month of June, I examine 
the trees closely, and if the wood is making rapid growth, I ring the 
part from which the vigorous shoots issue. This immediately hum¬ 
bles the growth of the wood, and the fruit keeps pace and swells in 
proportion with it. 
The Fig-house in the gardens at Belsay-Castle, is of particular 
construction, being only four feet wide inside, the upright glass in 
front ten feet high. The border is prepared on the north side of the 
back wall, the wall being built on arches for the roots to get through. 
The trees are planted inside, and trained against the wall. There is 
no artificial heat to the house. The border was prepared with a 
strong hazelly loam, the soil which I use for melons, taken from the 
top of a limestone quarry. I never saw finer figs than were produ¬ 
ced in that house, particularly the Dwarf Brown Naples, which got 
to a great size, and could not be exceeded in point of flavour. 
May 2nd, 1834. 
ARTICLE IV.—ON THE CULTURE OF PEAS. 
BY MR. W. TOWNSEND. 
In two of your preceding numbers, I have given you an account of 
the different varieties of the garden Pea, and perhaps it would not be 
considered altogether amiss to offer a few observations relative to their 
cultivation, &c. It is, I believe, a general practice for peas to be 
sown in rows, from two to five feet apart, according to the height 
which the different varieties grow ; a practice of which I do not alto¬ 
gether approve, with the exception of the earliest crops, there being 
in general but certain compartments suitable for them. The method 
I have been in the habit of pursuing, is to sow the seeds of the second 
and after crops in rows, a considerable distance apart, sav from 
twenty to thirty feet, according to the size of the Kitchen Garden, 
or the quantity required. The interval between the rows is croped 
