Am.  J  our.  Pharm. 
May,  1905. 
The  Cultivation  of  Saffron. 
211 
the  one  product  that  was,  at  least,  worth  its  weight  in  silver,  and  to 
this  day  I  do  not  purchase  the  home  product  in  any  other  way. 
Saffron  is  placed  on  one  scale  pan  and  silver  upon  the  other,  and,  as 
we  say,  what  it  draws,  the  seller  receives.  You  may  question  this 
commercial  singularity — it  is  that  way  or  no  way;  unless  the 
equivalent  is  proven  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  seller.  In  my  county 
— Lebanon — the  cultivation  of  saffron  is  declining  ;  it  is  dying  out 
with  the  generation  of  the  Pennsylvania  German  housewives  now 
passing,  and  as  the  care  of  the  saffron  bed  is  generally  confined  to 
the  female  head  of  the  household  for  the  reason  that  a  portion  of 
the  garden  (the  woman's  domain)  is  usually  set  apart  for  this  pur- 
pose. The  girls  growing  up  to  take  their  places,  prefer  attending 
crops  not  requiring  the  tedious  care  that  saffron  does  ;  strawberries, 
and  other  small  fruits  having  more  attraction  for  them,  which,  while 
not  quite  as  profitable,  do  not  require  the  same  amount  of  labor. 
I  took  occasion  to  visit  several  homes  where  were  found  saffron 
beds,  just  at  the  season  (late  in  October)  while  a  few  flowers  were 
still  to  be  found.  I  am,  therefore,  able  to  give  the  following  facts: 
The  soil  is  first  well  prepared  (indeed  the  same  preparation  must  be 
made  as  is  needed  for  a  garden),  much  attention  is  given  to  fertiliz- 
ing with  well-rotted  barnyard  manure,  the  soil  thoroughly  worked 
with  spade  and  rake,  and  after  this  preparatory  work  the  bulbs  are 
planted  as  early  in  the  spring  as  possible ;  the  usual  custom  is  to 
place  6  inches  apart  in  drills,  about  5  to  8  inches  deep,  6  inches 
apart  between  the  rows,  and  evenly  covered.  The  bulbs  rest 
'through  the  summer  thus  planted,  but  the  same  bed  is  utilized  for 
lettuce  as  a  first  crop,  cucumber  or  any  vegetable  that  will  mature, 
so  that  the  bed  can  be  cleared  by  early  fall.  The  saffron  patch  I 
saw,  and  have  a  note  of,  had  produced  a  crop  of  early  radishes,  some 
lettuce  and  a  large  crop  of  cucumbers  ;  without  digging  deep,  the 
soil  was  again  lightly  worked  and  made  mellow,  as  was  done  for 
spring  planting,  after  removing  the  refuse  vines  and  weeds ;  in  a 
few  weeks  thereafter,  about  the  time  of  the  early  autumn  frosts  in 
the  latter  part  of  September  or  October,  the  sombreness  of  the  sea- 
son is  cheered  by  the  growth  of  the  crocus ;  when  the  flower  and 
leaf  appear  almost  simultaneously  and  as  soon  as  the  flower  matures, 
the  real  labor  commences.  It  is  declared  by  growers  that  when  the 
flower  appears  as  soon  as  the  foliage,  the  yield  is  most  abundant ; 
the  flowers  are  plucked  daily,  early  in  the  morning,  and  it  is  usually 
