January 30. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
339 
It is because I love, and love earnestly, all that has tended 
to make it what it is ; and in gratitude, I feel bound to love 
and to praise the land of my forefather’s adoption, and of 
my own birth. The only proof I can give of that sentiment 
existing, is in the repudiation of the calumny and slander 
of those who are dissatisfied with it, and who do not hesitate 
to use stronger language in depreciation of it than I can 
produce in its favour. 
Until the “Channel Islands” have been visited, and all 
their beauties and merits have been realized, and well 
weighed, either as places of temporary sojourn or prolonged 
residence, allow “ opinion,” I say, to be weighed in the 
scale of reason, unalloyed by imagination, and “ Jersey,” 
as the principal of those islands, has nothing to fear as to 
being “ found wanting.” All that is beautiful in the shape 
of bill, dale, cliff, valley, dell, and bay, are contained in her 
circumscribed space, and if the eye is not pleased, and the 
mind inflated, and the tongue loosed to give expression to 
the joy felt in meeting the one, there is ample opportunity 
of meeting the other within a very short space, either of 
time or distance; but should terra firmu not contain the 
joys hoped to be realised on its surface, the “ ocean blue ” 
lies at its feet, with all its grandeur and magnificence of extent 
—with all the excitement which may be enjoyed on her 
surface, and all the dangers which may be incurred on her 
breast, as well as the “skiff” in which you may ply upon 
her bosom. What more, I would ask, do the dissatisfied 
require ? Would they have Baron Munchausen’s fictions 
to be realities ? Or would they have roses grown without 
thorns ? It can’t be so ! The sweetest roses have the most 
prickly thorns. The greatest pleasures are attended or 
followed with the most ungratifying alloy. And nature has 
willed it that we should be so constituted as to require 
more from her than she is prepared to grant us, and as in 
one consecutive line of allegory the prettiest and the most 
agreeable places of residence have their attendant incon¬ 
veniences. Digression is not the maintenance of a subject, 
and I have been directing the reader's attention to the 
opinions of visitors, and not to the soil and its produce, 
which was the object I had in view when commencing this 
article. So now to the originally-proposed task. 
The enormous crops of Potatoes which are sometimes 
produced may be inferred from the following facts relative 
to the produce of a piece of made ground belonging to 
Mr. I. N. W., in Belmont Road, St. Heliers. This gentle¬ 
man has a piece of ground, which, as the town extended in 
the north-eastern direction, became surrounded with roads 
four to five feet above the level of the meadow, of which it 
originally formed a part, and which has been filled up with 
every imaginable kind of refuse from the town to bring it 
to a proper level with the surrounding surface. From the 
broken slates, tiles, brickbats, and refuse materials of a 
building, up to the corroded cast-iron shoot which was once 
suspended under the eaves of the adjoining roof, and the 
clinkered cinders from the blacksmith’s forge, which had 
served to weld the same hard materials, and render it 
malleable to the sledge or hammer;—from the hat, which 
was once exalted to the dignity of covering the public 
functionary’s bead, down to the hob-nailed boot, which had 
seen so much service as to be not fit to be worn on the 
labourer’s foot;—from the coat, which was once worn, on 
account of its respectable appearance—perhaps in exulta¬ 
tion—by its owner, at its peculiar adaptability to his person, 
if not to men in general, to the plaited straw, which formed 
a part of the “ protector ” of some fair one’s head and physio- 
nominical attractions;—and from the refuse of the zinc 
and tinman’s workshop, to the shavings and sweepings from 
the carpenter’s shop, and the oyster-shells and moistened 
straw from the oyster-stand:—all these rough materials and 
rejections, with almost every other conceivable kind of rub¬ 
bish, constitute the basis of this particular spot, with a 
covering of clay, cinder-ashes, road-scrapings, and the sandy 
soil dug out in the formation of the drains in passing 
through the town. This composition, after being mixed 
together, was planted, during the first two seasons, with 
Potatoes, which did not produce, as can be well imagined, 
very much more than sufficed to pay for labour and manure. 
It was then, unprofitably, laid down for Lucerne, for two 
years ; which not realising the proprietor’s expectations, he 
liad it broken up again in the winter of 1852—53, and well 
manured with lime, night-soil, and road-scrapings, which 
was mixed with the surface-soil in the ploughing, using 
long litter at the time of planting. And now we come 
to the second years’ crop after the Lucerne, which is the 
particular crop to which I was most desirous of calling 
attention. 
When this piece of ground was turned over, in the winter 
of ] 853—51, the superficial surface of which is one-and-a- 
half vergees, or two-thirds of an English acre, a good coat¬ 
ing of stable-manure was ploughed into it, and it was then 
planted in rows, at twenty inches apart, with different kinds, 
but principally with Gold/inders and a variety known here 
as Newfoundland Potatoes. (The name, doubtless, pro¬ 
ceeding from their having been introduced to the island 
from that place, with which this island does a large trade.) 
The growth was extraordinary; the haulm averaging two- 
and a-half feet in height, and being of a hard, woody, fibrous 
texture, the crop was carefully hoed up during the growth. 
The haulm, at one period during its growth, showed slight 
symptoms of being diseased, the leaves becoming spotted, 
and decaying in places ; but on examination it proved to be 
caused by the treading down of trespassers. The amount 
of produce, when dug out in the month of October, was 
100 cabots of 40 lbs. weight, or a total of 1000 lbs., equal to 
an average of twelve tons to the acre. If this crop had been 
sold at the rate of 2s. per cabot, the price at which more 
than three-fourths of them were sold, it would have realised 
the handsome sum of X40—handsome remuneration for the 
labour and manure expended on its surface. This is but 
one of numerous instances of a like character (I could re¬ 
cord another and another, but the sequel would be about 
the same, with the exeeption of its being a piece of ground 
made in a gravel-pit); but I have selected this amongst 
them as being the best proof of the susceptibility of a waste 
piece of ground being turned to good account by proper 
management. The piece of ground has always been suffi¬ 
ciently remunerative to cover expences incurred on it since 
it was filled up, and it has, consequently, cost the proprietor 
little more than the “ loss of the rent” during the filling-up 
process, and an exercise of that invaluable and meritricious 
virtue “ patience,” to make it what it is. 
It is a common circumstance to hear of the successes of 
particular individuals who have broken up cotil and other 
previously uncultivated pieces of ground for early crops, 
breaking them up in the late autumnal months, when there 
is little else to do on the farm, and planting with a good coat¬ 
ing of manure in January, digging out a valuable and remu¬ 
nerative crop in May and beginning of June. One instance 
I have heard of, a farmer clearing X100 last spring in this 
manner. I am always pleased to hear of such circumstances, 
as they act as instigators to others who may be similarly 
situated, as well as bear corroborative proof of the spon¬ 
taneous vegetation of the island. 
A great diversity of opinion seems to exist here as to the 
period at which Rotatoes should be planted. Some of our 
cultivators consider they should be in the ground as early 
as October or November, being thus buried for some months 
previous to commencing their growth; a plan of which I 
very much disapprove, as the ground becomes flattened by 
the autumnal rain, and so hardened as to cause it to adhere 
too closely to the set to be beneficial to it; whilst it at the 
same time impedes the growth of the young shoots and the 
rootlets which proceed from them, and on which the new 
tubers are produced. Whilst others, and I think judiciously, 
defer planting until January and February, when the worst 
of the wet weather and the long-continued autumnal damps 
are over, and availing themselves of fine, dry weather for 
the planting and manuring. These often produce earlier 
and better crops than their neighbours whose crops have 
been planted four or five months before theirs. 
Much importance is to be attached to the manuring of 
the crop, and to the character of the soil with which that 
manure is to be mixed. Lime in the first place, and long, 
loose litter in the planting, suit the stiff soils; but the 
decayed vegetable and animal matters are most suitable to 
the light soils. It is a generally accepted, and, I believe, 
correct impression, that light soils suit Potatoes best; but 
I, nevertheless, think that soils may be rendered too light for 
them, and the scorching heat of the July sun may sometimes 
affect the haulm, and prematurely ripen the crop; this 
