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Page 15
It should be remembered that culture does for soil what it does
for men and women. It mellows, brings it up, and renders it
capable of finer products. Much, indeed, can be done with a crude
piece of land in a single year when treated with the thoroughness
that has been suggested, and some strong-growing vegetables may be
seen at their best during the first season; but the more delicate
vegetables thrive better with successive years of cultivation. No
matter how abundantly the ground may be enriched at first, time
and chemical action are required to transmute the fertilizers into
the best forms of plant-food, and make them a part of the very
soil itself. Plowing or spading, especially if done in late
autumn, exposes the mould to the beneficial action of the air and
frost, and the garden gradually takes on the refined, mellow,
fertile character which distinguishes it from the ordinary field.
In dealing with a thin, sandy soil, one has almost to reverse the
principles just given. Yet there is no cause for discouragement.
Fine results, if not the best, can be secured. In this case there
is scarcely any possibility for a thorough preparation of the soil
from the start. It can gradually be improved, however, by making
good its deficiencies, the chief of which is the lack of vegetable
mould. If I had such soil I would rake up all the leaves I could
find, employ them as bedding for my cow and pigs (if I kept any),
and spread the compost-heap resulting on the sandy garden. The
soil is already too light and warm, and it should be our aim to
apply fertilizers tending to counteract this defect. A nervous,
excitable person should let stimulants alone, and take good,
solid, blood-making food. This illustration suggests the proper
course to be taken. Many a time I have seen action the reverse of
this resulting disastrously. For instance, a man carts on his
light thin soil hot fermenting manure from the horse-stable, and
plows it under. Seeds are planted. In the moist, cool, early
spring they make a great start, feeling the impulse of the
powerful stimulant. There is a hasty and unhealthful growth; but
long before maturity the days grow long and hot, drought comes,
and the garden dries up. Therefore every effort should be made to
supply cool manures with staying qualities, such as are furnished
by decayed vegetable matter composted with the cleanings of the
cow-stable. We thus learn the value of fallen leaves, muck from
the swamp, etc.; and they also bring with them but few seeds of
noxious vegetation.
On the other hand, stolid, phlegmatic clay requires the stimulus
of manure from the horse-stable. It can be plowed under at once,
and left to ferment and decay in the soil. The process of
decomposition will tend to banish its cold, inert qualities, and
make the ground loose, open, and amenable to the influences of
frost, sun, and rain.
Does the owner of light, warm soils ask, "What, then, shall I do
with my stable-manure, since you have said that it will be an
injury to my garden?" I have not said this--only that it will do
harm if applied in its raw, hot, fermenting state. Compost it with
leaves, sod, earth, muck, anything that will keep it from burning
up with its own heat. If you can obtain no such ingredients, have
it turned over and exposed to the air so often that it will decay
without passing through a process approaching combustion. When it
has become so thoroughly decomposed as to resemble a fine black
powder, you have a fertilizer superior to any high-priced patent
compound that can be bought. Further on I will show how it can be
used both in this state and also in its crude condition on light
soils with the best results.
It is scarcely possible to lay too much stress on this subject of
fertilizers. The soil of the garden-plot looks inert: so does
heavy machinery; but apply to it the proper motive power, and you
have activity at once. Manure is the motive power to soil, and it
should be applied in a way and degree to secure the best results.
To produce some vegetables and fruits much is required; in other
growths, very little.
In laying out a garden there are several points to be considered.
The proprietor may be more desirous of securing some degree of
beauty in the arrangement than of obtaining the highest condition
of productiveness. If this be true, he may plan to make down its
centre a wide, gravelled walk, with a grape-arbor here and there,
and fruit-trees and flowers in borders on each side of the path.
So far from having any objection to this arrangement, I should be
inclined to adopt it myself. It would be conducive to frequent
visits to the garden and to lounging in it, especially if there be
rustic seats under the arbors. I am inclined to favor anything
which accords with my theory that the best products of a garden
are neither eaten nor sold. From such a walk down the middle of
the garden the proprietor can glance at the rows of vegetables and
small fruits on either side, and daily note their progress. What
he loses in space and crops he gains in pleasure.
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