Page:The family kitchen gardener - containing plain and accurate descriptions of all the different species and varieties of culinary vegetables (IA familykitchengar56buis).pdf/14

 gallons of water—the liquid to be used when the vegetables are in a growing state. Gypsum is beneficial, but not of any duration. Poudrette is a very active manure, highly exciting to early crops. The safest and best of all manures are the combined deposits of the horse, the cow, and the pig; these, thrown into a heap to ferment, saturating it with all the soap-suds and urine that can be collected, will form the best, the safest, and most permanent manure, not equalled by any or all of the nostrums of the age. It may be applied at the rate of from twenty to thirty tous per acre. This quantity is not too much, when a garden is regularly cultivated. It requires no adept in vegetable culture to take at least two crops a year from the ground. Lime is not genial to the growth of vegetables; its principal function as a manure appears to be, to dissolve the organic matter in the soil and facilitate its decay. Soils of a sour, heavy nature, full of thready, undecomposed vegetable fibre, are greatly benefited by a dressing of air-slacked lime; but on rich soils, well cultivated, its effects are unfavorable to the growth of culinary vegetables.

is not our intention to go into a detail of all the useful articles connected with the culture of the garden, which would take us beyond our limits. Our object will be only to point out those most useful and essential to carry on the cultivation of the soil. The materials of which they are composed are chiefly of iron and wood; the best quality of both should be used, nothing purchased merely for its being cheap. The cheapest is the best and most durable to accomplish the end.

The spade is a very common tool, and should be of steel, with a hickory or ash handle, having two rivets through its head. No. 2, of the manufactory, is the most convenient size. Some American spades are equal to any of British manufacture.