THE CABBAGE

No. I.

OF all subjects treated of in books, nothing is further removed from the domain of esthetics and poetry than the cabbage. The literary reader will search his favorite authors in vain, for any considerable scrap or essay upon this esculent. It is not found in the favorite pasture-grounds of the poets, and genius has never sought to invest it with a beauty and glory not its own. There is something noble in a field of wheat, whether tossing its green plumes in the breezes of early summer, or waving its heavy-laden heads in the golden sunshine of harvest. The hay fields are beautiful in the greenness of spring, and all the way up to their maturity, and the hay-making season is always associated with fragrant odors and the blithe sounds of farm-life in the summer. The maize is a noble plant, and we could cultivate it for its dark green, tropical leaves, its lofty spikes, and green tassels, if it bore no grain. But the cabbage, alas! what object in field or garden is so little attractive? The beet is as lowly, but the beet has the rich, generous blood of a sensitive thing. Cut it, and see how beautiful are the concentric rings of scarlet and crimson. The carrot is more humble, but the bright orange of its root redeems it from vulgarity. The turnip, first cousin of the cabbage, is about as ugly, but then it has sense enough to know it, and burrows as much in the dirt as possible to keep out of sight. But the cabbage, unconscious of its deformity, lifts its big drum head in the air, perched upon a rough, ungainly stump, as if “it were a thing of beauty, and a joy forever."

Coleridge once ventured to write lines to an ass, but it was a young one with the ears not yet fully developed. That animal in its maturity would probably have been a damper even to the musical fire of his genius. From the fact that cabbage is not yet sung, it may be termed the ass among vegetables. Its leaves are somewhat large and broad, and suggestive of ears. In quality it is hardly more attractive than in appearance. It is not an aristocratic vegetable, and is seldom found in the best society. Onions are eschewed because they taint the breath; cabbage because it disorders weak stomachs. Dyspeptics have a horror of it, and literary gentlemen in general, whose digestive organs are in the head rather than within the viscera. But the cabbage, plebeian though it be among vegetables, is in excellent repute with the laboring classes, and is said to be one of the best sustainers of muscle furnished by the garden. For men and women in sound health, it is a wholesome article of diet, and should have a place in every rural garden.

The History of this unattractive plant is in keeping with its appearance and quality. It is mostly unwritten, and like unappreciated merit in the higher walks of life, waits a biographer to do it justice. The cabbage has stolen very quietly into favor, and made itself essential to society, without raising much of a dust. It is probably more associated in the minds of our readers with the Dutch than with any other nation. Whether they were the first people to appreciate its merits, history is not very clear. They have given their name to several varieties, and we have the early dwarf Dutch, flat Dutch, and red Dutch, as a consequence of the sojourn of the cabbage among that people. England also has its admirers of this plant, as early York, late York, large York, early Wellington, Battersea, and other names of favorite kinds attest. Ireland has not furnished as many names among cabbages, but probably no class of our foreign population are more liberal consumers of this product of the garden.

The consumption of cabbage in all our cities and large towns is enormous. The suburban market gardeners find this article in demand for twelve months in the year, and with a little skill in wintering the heads, and in preparing cold frame plants for early culture, the demand is readily met. They find too, that few crops pay better than this. Two crops may be grown in a season from the same soil, or they may be grown as an early or late crop in connection with other vegetables. The cabbage is among the hardiest products of the garden, growing nine months in the year, and requiring little skill to raise it in perfection. In the vicinity of New-York and Philadelphia it is a prime article of cultivation among gardeners, and fields of many acres may be seen covered with this crop. Some growers send from one to two hundred thousand to market in a single season. No sight is more common at the ferries, or in the vicinity of our markets, than the cabbage wagons filled to the top of their racks. Large stories are told of the profitableness of this crop, but in the absence of reliable statistics, we will not repeat them. In discussing this vegetable, we will begin with

The Wintering of Cabbages, a topic that comes last in logical order, but is most opportune for our readers, as the season is already at hand when this crop should be removed to its winter quarters. We will suppose that your crop has been a successful one; the summer and fall varieties are already marketed, and you have on hand a lot that you wish to preserve for winter and spring use. How can you keep them in good condition?

Several methods are used. The Indians are said to have preserved them by burying the heads, and leaving the roots above ground. We have tried this mode, putting the heads bottom upwards upon a board, and drawing the earth up about the stumps six or eight inches deep. They did not keep remarkable well.

A plan more successful with us has been, to dig a trench in a dry place, six to ten inches deep, and put into this two round pieces of wood, running through the entire length, and about three inches apart. Upon these the cabbages are inverted, surrounded with straw, and the whole covered up with earth deep enough to protect them from frost. This earth is well packed down by spatting with the back of a shovel, and sheds off most of the falling rain, which runs into the deep trenches upon the sides, made by removing the soil for banking up. The ends of the trench are left open so as to allow a circulation of air. The only objection we have found to this plan is, that mice have sometimes entered and destroyed numbers of the cabbage.

Many of our farmers have out-of-door cellars, constructed solely for wintering vegetables, Cabbages are set out within these in their natural position, and do very well until the severe | weather requires the entrance to be stopped, when they suffer for want of air. We never saw a cabbage come out in good condition in the spring, kept in this way.

We keep but a few for family use during winter, and have succeeded admirably in the following method. We can recommend it to all housekeepers and gardeners, who only wish to secure enough for home consumption. We select the north side of a board fence, wall, or building, and dig a trench some six or eight inches deep; put in a row of cabbages, and earth them up nearly to the heads; then prepare another trench so near, that the heads will but just touch each other; put in another row, and so on, until the whole is finished. We make a covering of rough boards over them when the ground begins to freeze, and cover it with seaweed or other litter.

For those who have large quantities to preserve, we recommend a practice which has long been successfully followed by many persons in the vicinity of New-York, and which is substantially the same as our own, except that the plow is used instead of the spade. A suitable spot is selected in a garden or field, some five or six feet wide, and of any desirable length from north to south, and free from standing water. A furrow is opened upon one side, and in this a row of cabbages placed side by side, with the heads inclined outward at an angle of about forty-five degrees. Another furrow is then turned in upon the roots of the first row and a second row placed in the new furrow. The same process is repeated till the whole width of the plot is filled up. The plow is then run upon both sides, turning the earth inwards to form side banks. Crotched sticks or limbs, or boards with a notch in the top, are then placed at intervals through the middle of the bed, which support rails laid as a ridge-pole, about two feet above the cabbages. Boards or light brushwood are then placed upon each side supported by the ridge-pole and side banks, and these are covered with straw, salt hay, or bog hay, and a final coating of earth well compacted and smoothed with a shovel so as to shed off rain. More soil may be put on as cold weather advances. The ends are covered in the same manner as the sides, with the exception that holes a foot or so in diameter are left, which are stuffed with straw or hay that may be removed when desired. These holes are left open except during freezing nights and the colder days. Put up in this manner, the the heads will continue to increase in size and solidity during the entire winter, and in the spring they will be found to have greatly increased in value.