132 
surface, it was 35-25 deg., the average of the previous ten 
years being 39-74 deg.; in March, 38 75 deg., the average 
being 40-99 deg. 
“ One practical lesson,” observes a contemporary, “ to be 
drawn from these important facts is, that seeds which might 
have been safely sown in February, 1846, ought not this 
year to be committed to the ground till April, and that 
nothing except the hardiest kinds can this year be safely 
sown before the end of the month; for until the earth at 
one foot below the surface reaches the temperature of 49 
deg., a great part of the flower-seeds which are regarded as 
hardy, cannot be ensured from rotting, especially- in the 
presence of wet weather. Physiologists know that seeds 
have their own specific temperature in which they indicate 
vitality-. The seed of the nettle will not germinate at a 
temperature sufficient for groundsel, nor the Cape marigold 
in the temperature that suits the nettle, nor the cocoa-nut 
in that which is sufficient for the Cape marigold. 
We are aware, also, that the seeds of some plants raised 
in a cold climate vegetate with more readiness than those 
from plants of the same kind ripened in a higher mean 
temperature: the same remark applies to certain shrubs and 
trees. Now it has never perhaps occurred to the farmer to 
try the effect of sowing in our rather warmer climate the 
seeds of field crops raised in Northern Europe—such as 
those of the swede and the common turnip—seeds which it 
is so desirable should germinate, and speedily get into their 
rough leaf. It is true that by the use of superphosphate of 
lime this result is much more easily accomplished than 
formerly ; but we are not without a strong suspicion, from 
the result of our own observations, that something useful 
might be derived from comparative trials with seeds l’aised 
on colder soils and at greater elevations than the land on 
which it is generally sown. 
But it is not from a low temperature and strong drying 
wind that our field crops are suffering; rain has been steadily 
deficient: so that while the demand for moisture has been 
great, the supply has been reduced. The depth of rain 
which fell in the neighbourhood of London in the four first 
months of the last five years was as follows :— 
1851. 
1852. 
1853. 
1854. 
1855. 
January . 
3.07 
2.72 
2.14 
1.92 
0.56 
February . 
0.90 
1.06 
0.59 
0.78 
0.73 
March . 
3.57 
0.25 
1.48 
0.42 
1.13 
April. 
1.65 
0.52 
2.58 
0.30 
0.10 
Total inches. 
9.19 
4.55 
6.79 
3.42 
2.52 
We see, then, that in the present year there has fallen 
only about 2| inches of rain; a quantity less by about an 
inch than in the corresponding period of the dry season 
of 1854, rather less than the amount of the month of April, 
1853, and an inch less than the depth which fell in the 
month of March, 1851. 
We have been used to annually note the period when 
certain crops are first available, and the result in most cases 
accords with what might reasonably be expected from the 
varying warmth and moisture of the spring; one or two 
crops, however, grown in the open air, offer rather a curious 
exception to the general rule, and in no case is this more 
remarkable than in that of our Asparagus beds ; and these, 
it will be noted, are more adapted for such a comparative 
record than other vegetable products, since they are a 
permanent crop, occupying year after year the same position. 
The beds to which we allude are placed in rather a 
sheltered situation, protected from the north and east winds 
by a high bank; but possessing no unusual advantages of 
soil, which is a sandy loam. From these beds the first 
available cutting was, in the year 1850, on the 17th April; 
1851, on the 25tli April; 1852, on the 22nd April; 1853, on 
the 5th May; 1854, on the 17th April; 1855, on the 22ud 
of April. It will be seen from this, that the difference is 
only about six days in five years; and that only in 1853 
(.the latest year) was there a difference of eighteen days 
between that and the earliest cuttings of six years. 
We may here mention that we have treated these beds 
during the last two years with dressings of common salt, 
guano, and liquid-manure, which lias materially added to 
the vigour of the plants and to the copious produce of the 
May 22. 
beds. These are four in number, each being sixty feet long 
by about three feet in breadth, and furnished witli two rows 
of plants, about a foot apart. As soon as the Asparagus 
cutting-time is over, a small trench about two inches deep 
is made between the rows of plants, from one end of the 
bed to the other: along this little channel two or three 
pounds of the best Peruvian guano, and an equal weight of 
common salt, are sprinkled, and upon this about twelve or 
fifteen pailfuls of the sewage from the bouse is poured; 
and when this is soaked into the bed, the whole is made 
smooth with the rake. The very same operation is repeated 
! when the ripened Asparagus stalks are cleared away in the 
autumn, before the beds are top-dressed with stable-dung for 
i the winter; and again in March, when the dung is pointed 
in, and the beds laid up for'the summer. We have occa¬ 
sionally, instead of the house sewage, employed a weak 
i liquid-manure, prepared by merely diffusing a portion of 
horse-dung through water.—J. 
ABOVE WORK, BUT NOT BEYOND WANT. 
By Sam Slick. 
Those who never work—those who number among their 
most precious privileges a complete exemption from not 
only the spur of necessity, but the pressure of duty, must 
find it hard to believe that there are people in the world 
whose destiny it seems to be, to work all the time. Yet, no; 
these are the very beings who think God has so ordered the 
lot of a portion of his children, in contrast to the all em¬ 
bracing beneficence of bis providence in other respects. 
These might be called the butterflies of the earth, if the 
butterfly was not an established emblem of soul. Their 
self-complacency is much soothed by the conviction that 
they are of “ the porcelain clay of human kind,” and they 
are thankful, or rather glad, that there is a coarser race, to 
whom hard work and hard fare are well suited. 
The fate of these two divisions of mankind is, after all, 
much more justly balanced than either portion is apt to 
imagine. There is a universal necessity for labour, and 
those who obstinately close their understandings against 
this fact, whether rich or poor, inevitably join the class of 
sufferers sooner or later. There is nothing in which what 
we call fate is more impartial. The poor are admonished 
by destitution, and the rich by ill health ; the mere idler by 
ennui, and the scheming sharper by disappointment and 
disgrace. Yet this same universal necessity is not more 
evident than is the undying effort to elude it. After 
centuries of warning, the struggle still continues ; its energy 
sustained sometimes by pride, sometimes by a downright 
love of ease, so blind that it looks no farther than the 
present moment. Thus much of the outer and obvious 
world, a theatre whose actors, from being, or supposing 
themselves to be, “ the observed of all observers,” have 
fallen into many unnatural views and artificial habits of life, 
all tending to one darling end of drawing a broad line 
between themselves and the “ common ” and the “ vulgar.” 
In these western wilds of America, where nature, scarce 
redeemed from primeval barbarism, seems to demand, with an 
especial earnestness, the best aid of her denizens, and where 
she pays with gold every drop that falls on her bosom from 
the brow of labour, there may be danger sometimes, methinks, 
danger of falling into an error of an opposite character. 
There is so much work to be done, and so few people to do 
it, that the idea of labour is apt to absorb the enflre area of 
the mind, to the exclusion of some other ideas not only useful 
but pleasant withal, and humanizing, and softening, and 
calculated to cherish the higher attributes of our nature. 
So far is this carried, that idleness is emphatically the vice 
for which public opinion reserves its severest frown, and in 
whose behalf no voice ventures an apologetic word. If a 
man drink, he may reform ; even if he should steal, w-e 
permit him to rebuild his character upon repentance; but 
if he be lazy, we have neither hope nor charity. 
Still, even among us, there are those to whose imagina¬ 
tion the dolcefar nieute is irresistible; and it must be con¬ 
fessed that they form a class which is not likely to raise the 
reputation of the followers of pleasure. They have one 
thing in common with the fashionables of the earth, a 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
