3S7 
Ululates in the plant, and the stem acquires a shrubby character. The 
production of flowers and fruit depends chiefly upon the amount of organ- 
izable matter previously prepared and stored up in the plant. If a fruit 
should set in the axil of the third or fourth leaf of a melon plant, it 
rarely grows or reaches maturity, I ecause a sufficient quantity of sap 
was not then prepared for its support ; but if the same plant had not 
been allowed to set a fruit before the twentieth leaf, then—owing to the 
amount of sap accumulated, and to the efficient foliage the plant would 
possess—the fruit would grow rapidly, and attain a high state of perfec¬ 
tion. The common onion forms a bulb one year, blossoms and seeds the 
next, and so dies; but persist in not allowing the plants to blossom, and 
the formation of other bulbs will be the result, as I have proved. 
If a tulip-grower has a bulb growing too luxuriant, producing seven 
or eight petals instead of six, in order to reduce the vigor of his plant, 
he allows it to ripen its seed. If a Dutch florist has a bulb, as a hya¬ 
cinth, new to him, and which he desires to propagate, he adopts means 
to prevent its flowering, and a progeny of young bulbs is the conse¬ 
quence. We grow the potato for its tubers, and not for the sake of its 
blossoms and seeds ; but the flowers as well as the tubers are formed of 
the organizable matter generated by the leaves; and, as a plant can only 
elaborate under given circumstances a certain amount of organizable 
matter, it follows that the more flowers and fruit there are formed, so 
much the less must be the quantity of sap which can be used in the 
formation of tubers. By plucking off the blossoms of late varieties, 
which formerly bore seeds abundantly, the weight of tubers was found 
to be considerably increased. 
In the last spring I planted three carrots of equal size; one plant was 
deprived of its leaves as soon as the flowers were produced, and no other 
leaves were suffered to grow. No. 2 was allowed to grow naturally, to 
retain its foliage, produce flowers, and ripen seeds. The flowers of No.3 
were destroyed as soon and as often as they appeared ; the foliage re¬ 
mained entire. No. 1 seemed to ripen the seed of two or three of the 
first formed umbels of flowers; the plant dried up, root and branch, 
early in summer. No. 2 ripened a full crop of seed, then died. No. 3 
made repeated efforts to produce flowers ; the plant continued green till 
destroyed by frost; the root was disorganized, but, as I anticipated, a 
