CHAPTER XI.

VEGETABLES FOR THE GARDEN.

Vegetables for the Garden, etc., with Descriptions and Directions for their Culture.-Assortment of Seeds for a Family Garden.

ARTICHOKE.

French, Artichaut.-German, Artischoke.-Spanish, Cinauco. Aleachofa.

PURPLE, GREEN, ETC.

BRIEF DIRECTIONS.

Sow thinly, or drop single seeds at a distance of three or four inches in drills one inch deep and twelve inches apart. Keep them perfectly clear of weeds, and hoe them often throughout the season.

The following spring transplant them into very rich soil, in hills four feet apart each way, setting one, two, or three plants in a hill. Keep them clean and cultivated as before.

Cover them well with earth or litter for winter.

Time: sow or transplant in early spring, say April at New York.

The purple (flowered) or green-globe artichoke resembles a huge thistle-head, formed with broad, thick scales. The heads are cut when of full size, just before blossoming, and being well boiled, are served up with drawn butter.

The eatable part consists of a thin layer of soft marrowy substance upon the inside of each scale, and the thick, tender, tabular base or bottom upon which the scales and down of the blossom are set. It may be cultivated as a tit-bit for an epicure, but would not form a very substantial contribution to a farmer's table.

It may be raised from seed sown at the opening of spring or from young suckers; it requires deep rich soil, and the plants or hills should stand at least four feet apart each way. A good winter protection of earth or litter is advisable, to be re

moved at the opening of spring, when the earth should also be lightly dug about them, and the hills dressed.

The time to cut the heads for use is immediately before the appearance of the blossom, just when the centre of the head begins to open.

JERUSALEM ARTICHOKE, HELIANTHUS TUBEROSUS. French, Poire de Terre.-German, Erde Apfel.—Spanish, Girasol.

This is a tuberous-rooted species of sunflower, which affords tolerable food for hogs when planted in a low rich spot, of which it can have full possession until the swine are turned in to root it up; it needs only to be once planted in the manner of potatoes to insure a large crop every year, if the hogs are kept out until fall, when they will leave enough seed in the ground for the next year's crop.

This root is sometimes used for pickling, or eaten cut up in vinegar as cucumbers, and still more rarely boiled for use by those who happen to fancy a sweetish, watery potato, which, when cooked, it nearly resembles. It has been used to some extent for sheep, and even the tops cured for winter fodder, but it is probably comparatively valueless for these purposes.

ASPARAGUS.

French, Asperge.-German, Spargel.-Spanish, Esparrago.

GIANT, WHITE, GREEN, ETC.

BRIEF DIRECTIONS.

Sow thinly in shallow drills twelve inches apart. Hoe often, and keep perfectly clear of weeds. At one year old the plants may be transplanted into permanent beds, at one foot apart each way. Time: sow in the fall or as early in spring as practicable. Transplant in spring.

Asparagus is a well-known and delicious vegetable; it is raised from seed, which may be sown in fall or early spring. The plants at one or two years old are transplanted into beds at one foot apart each way, or, if cultivated upon a large scale, into rows at three feet distance, so as to admit the plow, the

plants being set one foot apart in the rows. It is absolutely necessary to give asparagus a warm, rich soil, and, if it is intended to make a permanent bed for a private garden, it would be well to dig out the whole space, and underlay the bed with six inches or more of well-rotted manure, or trench the ground at least eighteen inches deep, mixing it thoroughly and plentifully with such manure in the process, adding sand or roadwash if the soil be heavy.

Let the bed be so prepared in the fall, and in spring, having dug it over, raked it smoothly, and with your marker laid it out in one-foot squares, put in your plants exactly at the points where the lines intersect, covering the crowns about three inches deep. Keep it perfectly clear of weeds, and, if a drought comes on, give attention to watering it.

One year from the time of planting you may expect a light. cutting for the table; but you had much better not cut any the first year after planting than risk the injury to your succeeding crops by cutting too much.

Top-dress your bed with well-rotted manure every fall, dig the surface lightly over in the spring, and water it with the old brine from your pork-barrel, or strew salt over the bed.

By this process you will have asparagus sufficiently gigantic; and, if you desire it white, cover your bed six or eight inches deep with road-wash or beach sand, and cut the asparagus at that depth with a long knife whenever it shows itself an inch or less above this covering.

In cultivating asparagus upon a large scale, let your land be most thoroughly manured; set the plants four inches deep, in rows three feet apart, and one foot between the plants in the row; keep it clean with the plow and corn-harrow, or cultivator, manuring it every fall if possible; and, if you choose to plow in the manure lightly across the rows, as if the ground were uncropped, it will bear the operation carefully performed without injury to the next year's product, and with great advantage in keeping it clean with little labor.

BEANS (English).

French, Feve de Marais.-German, Grosse Bohne.-Spanish, Haba. BROAD WINDSOR, LONG pod, &c.

BRIEF DIRECTIONS.

Drop the seed at about three inches distance, in drills two inches deep and two feet apart.

Hoe often, drawing the earth to them a little from time to time until they are in full bloom: then nip the end of each stem an inch or two, and wait for the crop.

Time: the earliest possible in spring both South and North, or through the winter months in the former.

These beans, if raised at all, should be planted in strong moist soil at the times and in the manner above directed.

They are used as shelled beans, being gathered when the pods attain their full size, but while still green and tender.

Though a favorite vegetable with some, they are rather a coarse delicacy, and are not likely to be generally esteemed. Commonly, too, they do not bear well with us, and if but a slight drought come upon them in their growth, the black aphis will eat them up.

The horse bean is a small variety of this species, which in Europe is raised extensively as a farm crop. It is commonly mixed with oats in feeding horses, being considered very strong food, and from its heating quality requiring to be used in moderate quantities.

BUSH BEANS.

French, Haricots nains.-German, Stambohnen.-Spanish, Frijoles.

BUSH BEANS. DWARF BEANS. KIDNEY BEANS. CRANBERRY BEANS. SNAPS.

Early Mohawk. Early China. Union. Rob Roy. Valentine. Large White Kidney. Marrowfat. Refugee, etc., etc.

BRIEF DIRECTIONS.

Sow thinly in rows from eighteen inches to two feet wide, and about an inch deep; hoe often, drawing the earth a little

to them, and sow plaster upon them at least once before they

blossom.

Time: corn-planting time for spring. July to October, according to latitude, for fall use or salting for winter.

At New York, May to August.

Bush beans are sometimes called kidney beans from the form of many of the varieties, and oranberry for the same reason; snaps from their being used while the pods are sufficiently tender to snap without showing fibres, and dwarfs or bush beans. from their habit of growth, not requiring poles, but being selfsupporters.

These beans may be planted from the very earliest cornplanting time to the last month of summer at the North, and at the South on into September. In favorable weather six weeks for the earlier kinds, and eight weeks for the later, will be found long enough to allow for the production of the green crop. They should be thinly sown in rows about eighteen inches or two feet apart, and covered about an inch. Hoe them well as soon as they come up, earth them up a little as they grow, sowing plaster lightly over them from time to time, and there is scarcely a fear of failure.

For early kinds, the Mohawk, the China, and the Valentine may be sown. To succeed these, the Union, the Rob Roy, the marrowfat, the large white kidney, and the refugee.

The China, the white kidney, the marrowfat, the Valentine, the Union, are all superior to the common white or dumpling. bean for winter use in the dry state, and on this account are preferable to the darker colored beans, which, when dry, are unfit for cooking, dark-colored beans being both strong and unsightly. The refugee is perhaps the best bean to plant late for pickles, or for salting green for winter use as a table vegetable.

For this latter purpose the beans are prepared as for cooking, many persons splitting the pods in the process, especially if they are pretty large or old. They are then slightly scalded, and when cool are packed closely into a keg or barrel, each layer being carefully but moderately salted, and a few sprigs of summer savory or other aromatic herb added. When required