February 13. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
385 
and bid fair to open. Can you tell the cause of these 
thingB ?—J. G.” 
[This frequently takes place from a warm, confined, 
moist atmosphere. Whenever you observe the least signs 
of the canker, or whatever it is called, daub the part with 
lime and charcoal dust. Two or three neglects in watering 
will cause some of tho flower-buds to do as you represent.] 
GROWING ONIONS FOR MARKET. 
“ I purpose sowing an acre of Onions this season, and I 
should feel obliged if you would inform me what quantity 
of seed per acre will be necessary, and the width of the 
drills one from another; also, if there be any machine by 
which the work may be more expeditiously performed than 
by the thumb and finger.—A n Old Subscriber from the 
first." 
[We think that we found an ounce to every rood was 
sufficient for sowing Onions on a large scale. We sowed in 
drills six inches apart, and delivered the seed from a pint 
glass bottle with a quill through the cork. It is an excellent 
and cheap drilling-machine for most small seeds. We 
sowed in beds four feet wide; and gave a top-dressing of 
soot. The last week in February is the best sowing time.] 
MISTLETOE AS THE FOOD OF ANIMALS.— 
WALNUT SHAVINGS FOR HEN’S NESTS. 
“ Can you inform me whether there is any truth in the 
statement that cows in calf are injured by eating Mistletoe ? 
and whether it does injury to other animals, such as pigs, 
calves, and sheep ? I have been told, also, that Walnut 
shavings are useful to make into nests for sitting hens, 
because they protect them frbm fleas. This I believe 
to be true.—T. Richardson.” 
[We do not think that there is any truth in the belief that 
the Mistletoe is injurious to the cow. It is quite certain 
that it is nourishing to pigs, being boiled and given to them 
in the southern orchard districts. Can any reader inform us 
whether the cow has been known to eat the Mistletoe ; and 
if so, what were the results ?] 
HOW LONDON IS SUPPLIED WITH MEAT, 
POULTRY, VEGETABLES, AND MILK. 
( Continued from paye 320.) 
The continued extension of London is, however, rapidly 
encroaching upon all the old market-gardens, and they are 
obliged to move farther afield; thus high cultivation, like a 
green fairy-ring, is gradually widening and enlarging its 
circle round tho metropolis. The coarser kinds of vegetables 
are but sparingly grown in these valuable grounds, but come 
up in large quantities from all parts of the country; and 
some of the choice kinds arc reared far away in Devon¬ 
shire and Cornwall, where they are favoured by the climate. 
It would be interesting to get an authentic statement, of the 
acreage dedicated to fruit and vegetables for the London 
market, but we find the information unattainable. Mr. Cut- 
hill calculates that there arc 200 acres employed around the 
metropolis in the growth of strawberries, and live acres 
planted as mushroom-beds. Cucumbers were once very 
largely cultivated. He has seen as many as fourteen acres 
under hand-glasses in a single domain, and has known 
200,000 gherkins cut in a morning for the pickle-mercliants. 
Strangely enough, they have refused to grow well around 
London ever since the outbreak of the potato disease. The 
disastrous epidemic of 18-19, we have little doubt, had much 
to do with the diminished supply, for tho cholera soon 
brought about the result desired by Mrs. Gamp, “when 
cowcumbers is three for twopence,” prices quite explanatory 
of the indisposition of the land to produce them. The very 
high state of cultivation in the metropolitan market-gardens 
necessitates the employment of a large amount of labour ; 
as it is supposed that no less than 35,000 persons are 
engaged in the service of filling the vegetable and dessert- 
dishes of the metropolis. This estimate leaves out those 
in the provinces and on the Continent, which would, 
we doubt not, nearly double the calculation, and show a 
troop of men and women as large as the allied army now 
acting in the East. There are five marts in London devoted 
to the sale of fruit—Covent-Garden, Spitalfields, the Borough, 
Farringdon, and Portman markets—besides a vast number 
of street offsets, such as Clare-market, in which hawkers 
generally stand with their barrows. Covent-Garden is not 
only their type, but it does nearly as much business as all of 
them put together, and for that reason we shall dwell upon 
it to the exclusion of the others. 
At the first dawn of morning in the midst of squalid 
London, sweet country odours greet the early-riser, and cool 
orchards and green strawberry slopes seem ever present to 
the mind. 
“ Bright volumes of vapour through Lothbury glide, 
And a river flows on through the vale of Cheapside.” 
If those who seek pleasure in gaiety have never visited the 
market in its prime, let them journey thither some summer 
morning, and note how fresh will seem the air, and how full 
of life the people, after the languid waltz in Grosvenor- 
squaro. The central alley of the “ Garden,” as it i.s called 
by the costermongers, is one of the prettiest lounges in town ; 
and, whether by chance or design, it forms a complete march 
of the seasons. At the western entrance the visitor is greeted 
with the breath of flowers ; and there they show in smiling 
banks piled upon the stalls, or sorted with frilled edges into 
ladies’ bouquets. As he proceeds, he conies upon the more 
delicate spring vegetables — pink shafts of the oriental¬ 
looking rhubarb, delicate cos lettuce, &c.; still further along 
the arcade, the plate-glass windows on either side display 
delicate fruits, done up in dainty boxes, and set off with 
tinted paper shreds. Behind these windows might be seen 
those rarities which it is the pride of the London market- 
gardeners to provide, and in producing which they all 
endeavour to steal the longest march upon time—a sieve-full 
of early potatoes, each as small and as costly as the egg of 
a Cochin-China fowl—a basin full of peas, at a guinea a pint 
—a cucumber marked 5s., and strawberries 18s. the ounce. 
The market-gardeners of Penzance are beginning to send 
up many of these early vegetables, the mildness of the 
south-western extremity of Cornwall giving them a wonderful 
advantage over every other part of the kingdom. Gentle¬ 
men's gardeners also contribute somewhat, by sending to 
the salesmen such of the produce of their glazed houses as 
is not consumed in the family, and receive articles in return 
of which they happen to have an insufficient quantity them¬ 
selves. These forced vegetables give way, it is true, as the 
season advances ; but when in, they are always most to be 
found at that end of the walk nearest the rising sun. As 
the year proceeds, the lustier and more natural fruits are 
displayed—peaches that have ripened with blushing cheek 
to the wind, gigantic strawberries, raspberries, nectarines, or 
blooming plums. Feathery pines add their mellow hue; 
and when these fail, the colour deepens into amber piles of 
oranges, umber filberts, and the rich brown of Spanish 
chesnuts, the produce of the waning year. 
To leave, however, our fancied procession of tho seasons, 
and to return to the actual business of the market. As 
early as two o’clock in the morning, a person looking down 
the dip of Piccadilly will perceive the first influx of the 
daily supply of vegetables and fruit to Covent-Garden 
market: waggons of cabbages, built up and regularly faced, 
with the art rather of the mason than the market-gardener; 
light spring-vans fragrant with strawberries; and milk-white 
loads of turnips which slowly roll along the great western 
road, and bring the produce of the fertile alluvial shores of 
the Thames to the great West End mart. The pedestrian 
proceeding along the southern and eastern roads sees the 
like stream of vegetable food quietly converging to the same 
spot. From this hour, especially upon a Saturday morning, 
until nine o’clock, the scene at the market itself is of the 
most exciting description. 
Without some organisation it would be impossible to 
receive and display to the advantage of the buyer and seller 
the varied products that in the grey of the morning pours 
into so limited a space. Accordingly, different portions of it 
are dedicated to distinct classes of vegetables and fruits. 
The finest of the delicate soft fruit, such as strawberries, 
peaches, &c., are lodged, as we have mentioned, in the 
central alley of the market—the inmost leaf of the rose. On 
the large covered space to the north of this central alley is 
