The complete Indian housekeeper & cook

The best plan to secure good mould for pots, or mixing, is to half fill a large trench with fallen leaves in January and Febru ry, add a few baskets of quicklime and bone dust, cover with fresh cow manure, and flood with \piter. Next autumn it will be ready for use. It can be sifted tlnoiigh a string bed set up on end. Soils are also to be doctored by adding to them what they want, as, for instance, the addition of sand to stiff clay when carrots are to be grown, or the addition of stiff tank clay or loam to sandy soils. Soil for seed-beds and seed-pans must also vary with the seed to be sown, but the foundation of all is well-rotted, enriched leaf mould, prepared as above. Without a plentiful supply of this it is useless alfempliiig to grow Jloirers. Housekeeper and Cook 133 Another jjjoocl manurej where a stimulant is wanted, is bone dust. Get the sweeper to collect old bones and have them pounded, buying them from him, if necessary, ready prepared. You will get them very cheap. Some of this maj' be mixed with soot or charcoal dust, and applied dry to the land ; but the best way of using it is by treating it with half its weight in sulphuric acid mixed with its whole weight in water, that is, two seei's each of bone dust and water to one of sulphuric. Put the dust in a big Mmli (or earthen vessel), and pour the acid and water over. It will dissolve the bones and make them into a soft paste, which will dry into a powdei-. A half handful of this, mixed with a large Avatering-can of Avater, Avill be sufficient for about fifty pots, and increase their groAvth Avonderfully. Reh, or salt soil, is very difficult to treat, but the best chance lies in washing out the salt, by flooding copiously Avith Avater. But, of course, Avhere the well is salt, this only increases the evil. Where this is the case, it is best to content oneself with growing plants Avhich stand the salt, a list of which Avill be given later on. Sowing. — In all cases, in pots or beds, the soil should be Avatered first and allowed to dry until it is friable. Seeds should invariably be soAvn in the evening if out in the open ; at any rate, until November shall have reduced the fierce heat of the sun. Every seed requires a different Avay of soAving, and a varying proportion to the amount of surface soAvn. This Avill he given under its OAvn proper heading. Proper labels should not be neglected ; and as the expense of ordinary Avooden ones is almost nominal in India, there is no excuse for the too common cleft stick Avith a bit of paper, Avhich the first inquisitive parrot or squirrel makes off Avith, to the confusion of the sower. If the Avritten side of the label be jnit underneath, instead of up, the subsequent Avatering Avill not Avash it out, even if it is Avritten in pencil. Walering. — Pot seeds are best watered (on a small scale) Avith a jug. By putting the lip against the edge of the pot, seeds and seedlings can be gently flooded without injury. Mali, hoAvever, in his unregenerate state, loves a thunder- storm produced by an ill-conditioned rose. Pie Avill there- after Avonder j)lacidly Avhy the seedlings damp off, and, as usual, lay it down to some disastrous combination of the planetary bodies. If the ground has been moistened before 134 The Complete Indian