The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1896-06-24
THE GARDEN.
BILL ARP TELLS HOW 1T SHOULD
BE CULTIVATED.

He Is Successful In Raising Fine Vegesta-
bles-A Good Farmer VIII Have a Good
Garden, and He isProud of His-TImely
Hints for All.
Fate cannot harm mel have
dined today" That is the way we
feel Just after dinner, especially if we
have earned it--worked for it bodily
and wanted it. But I have heard folks
say they were never hungry and not
even the odor of cucumbers and onions
in the dining room would excite their
appetite. 1 have heard others say they
had the appetite, but were afraid to
indulge it because of indigestion.
Such folks are to be pitied. They
have my sympathy. But I sincerely
believe that work or physical exercise
is remedy for both. 1 suppose that
Shakespeare suffered in this way, for
he says, Now, let digestion wait on
appetite and health on both" Certain
it is his death was sudden and prema-
ture, for he lived only fifty years.
Milton understood this trouble, too, for
he says that Adams sleep was sweet,
being bred from pure digestion. That's
the secret-working in the garden-I
inherited that trait from the old man
Adam, I mean-and Isleep sweetly,
too, after I have worked in my gar
den. There is no insomnia about me,
but Mrs. Arp suffers from it sometimes
when l am snoring like a hippopota'
mus.
I was Illuminating about the value of
a good garden to the family-we had
an excellent dinner today, and 1
counted up the cost. We have FIVE in
the family, and the dinner cost us only
S cents apiece, and there was enough
left for two or three more. We had a
small piece OF middling meat, about
half pound, that was boiled with the
beans, and there were seven different
kinds of vegetables from my garden.
The butter and buttermilk where home
made. The rice and cornmeal and
huckleberries cost little-not much.
Everything was well. cooked, and all
that was wanted was an appetite and
good digestion.
lam reasonably proud of my garden,
for it is all my own work. prepared
the ground and dressed it and opened
the burrows and planted the seed and
cultivated the plants and killed the
weeds, and it is my especial pleasure
to watch everything as it grows, and
gather the vegetables and wash them
at the back door and call the good wife
and children out to see them and listen
to their compliments. We have had a
long drought, but I had fortified
against it. Every hill was first spaded
out foot deep and filled with water,
and it had soaked into the ground 1
filled up the hole with a mixture of
top soil and barnyard scrapings and
silted ashes and put on some more
water. Every furrow I opened for
beans and peas and beets l let water
run in it, and then put the fertilizer
in and planted the seed. had eighty
holes to dig for tomatoes and forty for
squashes, and as many more for Gu
cumbers, and Notwithstanding the
drought everything has grown vigor-
ously. 1t is hard work and takes pa
tience to lay the fundation in this
way, but it pays. My squash vines
cover a space of four feet square to
each hill, and my tomato plants are
five feet high and tull of healthy fruit.
Well, now to tell the whole truth, I
have hydrant in the center of the
garden and when the dry, hot weather
was atits worst I opened small treanch-
es close by the roots of the plants and
turned the water on and let il run
slowly and soak in and afterwards
covered the trenches with dry dirt.
This, too, is trouble, but it paid well.
Some folks sprinkle, but that does
harm and no good. 1t breakes the
surface and never reaches the roots
sprinkle nothing but grass. Where
water is plenty and convenient there
is no excuse for poor garden. 1t is
better to dig deep and fertilize and cul-
tive square rod we'll than to skim
over half an acre ''nigger fashion"
and see it all dry up when the dry
drought, as Cobe calls it, comes. The
intensive system is the best for garden
1 know from long experience. 1t made
me sad to see the crops on the railroad
between Marietta and Atlanta the
other day. Acres and acres of corn
not six inches high and cotton almost
invisible. 1t did look like perishing
to death in the name of the Lord. 1t
is poor country, know, but they
could SOW it down in peas and gradu'
ally improve it so that a Georgian
wouldn't be ashamed for travellers to
look out of the car window as they
ride through it.
It is astonishing how much influence
one good farmer has over the neigh
borhood in which he lives. They are
very envious of each other and will
try to keep up with the best. hear
some say mat their oats crop is total
failure, and will not be fit to cut. l
see a few acres of oats in q field not far
from me that will make good crop.
Of course there is something in the
land, but there is more in the farming.
Deep plowing to begin with is abso-
lutely necessary in farming. 1 don't
mean deep turning, but deep plowing,
I know a farmer who always follows
the turn plow with a bul-tongue in
the same furrow, and he makes good
crops whether it rains or not. My
good neighbor, Widow Fields, has no
hydrant in her garden, but she always
has the finest garden in the town, and
the secret is deep plowing and fertil-
izine, lean overlook her work from
my window, and it excites me to keep
in hailing distance. She has an acre
in the HIGHEST state of cultivation, and