Many kinds of vegetables will not admit of transplanting, but the seed must be sown thinly, in straight and equidistant drills; and when the young plants are fairly out of the ground, they must be thinned out by the hoe or by hand, leaving single plants only at such distances apart as they will require to be at when they are fully grown. It should be mentioned here, that nothing is so bad for plants as allowing them to be too close together; more produce, whether it be in roots, leaves, or fruit, is obtained from fine healthy plants that have had sufficient room to grow in, than from twice their number grown in the same space, and, consequently, crowded together.

Peas, scarlet-beans, and other climbing-plants, require sticks to be put to them to climb up; the sticks used for this purpose are the loppings of young trees, cuttings of underwood, &c., with the smaller branches and twigs left on; these sticks are set on each side of the row of peas, and are set sloping in contrary directions, thus forming a lattice-work, which furnishes support for every shoot to mount up by means of its tendrils.

Celery is blanched by planting the young plants at the bottom of trenches, dug twelve or eighteen inches deep; in proportion as the celery grows, the earth, which was taken out of the trenches, is put back again with care that it may not get into the heart of the plants.

The stems growing thus underground, or kept from the light and air, remain white, or do not acquire the green hue of plants exposed to the light of the sun. In consequence of this mode of proceeding, when the celery has finished growing, and is ready for use, it will be found buried in the centre of elevated ridges, the intermediate furrows being caused by the removal of the earth to form these. The plants are dug out as wanted.

Sea Kale is blanched by remaining constantly covered during its growth by earthenware pots, made tall expressly for this purpose. The pots have a small cover which takes off, to allow of the progress of the kale being examined,

Plants that grow early in the spring, or which are prematurely brought forward by forcing on hot beds, require to be sheltered on the approach of frost. A very slight covering is sufficient in many cases, straw litter or fern leaves even being enough to prevent the radiation of heat from the earth, and when, in addition to these, mats of bass are spread over them, the frost must be severe that can penetrate to the plants beneath.

Single plants are sheltered by covering them over with garden pots, or with hand-glasses, small frames made of lead or iron, in which panes of glass are inserted, as the casements of cottages are glazed.—Saturday Magazine.

SCENE FROM "ROMEO AND JULIET."

MERCUTIO.

ROMEO.

Mercutio. O, then, I see Queen Mab hath been with

you,

She is the fairies' midwife; and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate stone
On the fore-finger of an alderman,

Drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep:
Her waggon-spokes made of long spinners' legs,
The cover, of the wings of grasshoppers;
The traces of the smallest spider's web;
The collars of the moonshine's watery beams;
Her whip of cricket's bone; the lash of film:
Her waggoner a small grey-coated gnat,
Not half so big as a round little worm
Prick'd from the lazy finger of a maid:
Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut,
Made by the joiner squirrel, or old grub,
Time out o' mind the fairies' coach-makers.
And in this state she gallops night by night

Through lovers' brains, and then they dream of love:

O'er courtiers' knees, that dream on court'sies straight:
O'er lawyers' fingers, who straight dream on fees:
O'er ladies' lips, who straight on kisses dream:
Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues,
Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are.
Sometime she gallops o'er a courtier's nose,
And then dreams he of smelling out a suit:
And sometime comes she with a tithe-pig's tail,
Tickling a parson's nose as 'a lies asleep,
Then dreams he of another benefice:
Sometime she driveth o'er a soldier's neck,
And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades,
Of healths five fathom deep; and then anon
Drums in his ear: at which he starts, and wakes;
And, being thus frighted, swears a prayer or two,
And sleeps again. This is that very Mab,
That plats the manes of horses in the night;
And bakes the elf-locks in foul sluttish hairs,
Which, once untangled, much misfortune bodes-
Romeo.

Thou talk'st of nothing.

Mer.

Peace, peace, Mercutio, peace,

True, I talk of dreams,

Which are the children of an idle brain,

Begot of nothing but vain fantasy;
Which is as thin of substance as the air;
And more inconstant than the wind who wooes
Even now the frozen bosom of the north,
And, being anger'd, puffs away from thence,
Turning his face to the dew-dropping south.

-Shakespeare,

THE PRINCIPAL GARDEN VEGETABLES WHICH SERVE FOR FOOD.

THE great variety of vegetable productions, which serve as food to man, speaking specially of those which he cultivates, may be classed under a few great divisions, conformably both with their botanical characters, and with the part of the plant which is consumed. Though there is no part of a plant which, in different species, is not eaten, yet, as forming a considerable portion of his diet, it will be found that it is either the root, the stem, the leaves, or the fruit, that man makes use of, while the bark, the seed, the flowers, the bud, &c., of other species, are commonly used as condiments or sauces.

Next to the Cerealia, the seeds of that order of plants, called from their fruit, Leguminous, contain the greatest proportion of farina. The pea and the bean are the principal kinds of this order, employed by man as food in Europe.

The Pea is a climbing annual plant with a white flower; the seed in its green or unripe state, constitutes a favourite dish, but for this purpose it is cultivated as a garden vegetable, while agriculture can alone furnish the ripe seed in sufficient quantities to supply the demand for dry peas in the navy, in hospitals, &c.

The pea requires warm soil, the crop is gathered when the pod is quite ripe and dry, the seed is thrashed out, the stalks and leaves (or the haulm) is sometimes given to the cattle as fodder.

The seed of the pea tribe divides into two more readily than most seeds, containing two seed leaves. Split peas are produced by grinding the seed tightly between millstones or plates of iron, in mills constructed for the purpose; this operation frees the germ of the seeds from the skin or coats, and also separates the former into the two portions, each of which consists of an undeveloped seed.

The Bean. This name is given to different species of

S. VI,

D

plants, though all belonging to the Leguminous order. The broad bean, of which the unripe seed alone is eaten as a vegetable, is a species of the genus Vetch, an annual growing to the height of from two to three feet, which, unlike the other species, is not a climbing plant. The delightful fragrance of its black and white flowers is familiar to every one; but the principal use of this bean, when ripe, is as fodder for horses, cattle, hogs, and poultry. The French or Haricot bean is a dwarf species, and the scarlet runner in Britain (one of the most universally cultivated of all garden vegetables) is another species of the same genus. The whole pod, or fruit of these plants, is eaten before it is ripe.

Both are of the easiest culture, but they must not be sown till all danger of frost is over. There are numerous varieties, and some of these are cultivated for food in nearly every country of the world where gardening is practised.

The Tare and the Lentil are species of the genus Ervum, and are used as food in some continental countries, but in England they are only cultivated as fodder.

The Leguminous order contains but few positively unwholesome or poisonous kinds; but among these, the Laburnum is best known for its beautiful flowers, which are such universal favourites.

The Potato belongs to a family of plants, almost every one of which is, in a greater or less degree, poisonous. The noxious principles generally abound in the fruit or leaves, while the roots or subterranean stems, such as the potato, are commonly innocent, if not wholesome, when boiled; but so formidable are the deleterious properties of the order, that even in the case of the valuable vegetable now under our consideration, the water in which it has been cooked is in a certain degree poisonous.

Starch in considerable quantities is obtained from potatoes, by crushing them, and well washing the pulp repeatedly in cold water till all the starch is extracted; the water then must be evaporated, or decanted off, and the starch will be left nearly pure.-Saturday Magazine,