snapped off rapidly, and where the quantity is considerable they should
be sorted into sizes. The season of use will be greatly prolonged, and
the tendency of the Sprouts to burst be lessened, if the head is cut
last of all.

==CABBAGE==

==Brassica oleracea capitata==

The Cabbage is a great subject, and competes with the Potato for
pre-eminence in the cottage garden, in the market garden, and on the
farm, sometimes with such success as to prove the better paying crop of
the two. It may be said in a general way that a Cabbage may be grown
almost anywhere and anyhow; that it will thrive on any soil, and that
the seed may be sown any day in the year. All this is nearly possible,
and proves that we have a wonderful plant to deal with; but it is too
good a friend of man to be treated, even in a book, in an off-hand
manner. The Cabbage may be called a lime plant, and a clay plant; but,
like almost every other plant that is worth growing, a deep well-tilled
loam will suit it better than any other soil under the sun. It has one
persistent plague only. Not the Cabbage butterfly; for although that is
occasionally a troublesome scourge, it is not persistent, and may be
almost invisible for years together. Nor is it the aphis, although in a
hot dry season that pest is a fell destroyer of the crop. The great
plague is club or anbury, for which there is no direct remedy or
preventive known. But indirectly the foe may be fought successfully. The
crop should be moved about, and wherever Cabbage has been grown, whether
in a mere seed-bed or planted out, it should be grown no more until the
ground has been well tilled and put to other uses for one year at least,
and better if for two or three years. There are happy lands whereon club