on of the sunlight and the lack of perfect ventilation.

=Moisture.=--Although the tomato is not a desert plant and needs a
plentiful supply of water, it suffers far more frequently, particularly
when the plants are young, from an over-supply than from the want of
water. Good drainage at the root and warm, dry, sunny air, in gentle
motion, are what it delights in. Good drainage is essential not only to
the best growth of the plant but to the production of any fruit of good
quality. So important is this feature that though it can be readily
proved that, other things being equal, the tomato will give larger yield
and better fruit on well drained clay loam than on sandy soil, yet it is
more generally and more successfully planted on sandy lands simply
because they are usually better drained and on this account give better
crops. While excess of water in the soil is most injurious to the young
and growing plant, an abundance of it at the time the fruit swells and
ripens is very essential, and a want of it at that time results in small
and imperfect fruit of poor flavor. Excessive moisture in the air is
just as injurious as at the root. In my personal experience I have known
of more failures in tomato crops, at least in the northern states, to
come from a season of persistent rains and damp atmosphere at the time
when the plants should be in bloom and setting fruit than from any other
climatic cause.

=Food supply.=--The tomato is not a gross feeder nor is the crop an
exhaustive one, but the plant is very particular as to its food supply.
It is an epicure among plants and demands that its food shall not only
be to its taste in quality but that it be well served. In order for the
plant to do its best, or even well, it is essential that the food
elements be in the right proportions and readily available. If there is
a deficiency of any single element there will be but a meager crop of
fruit, no matter how abundant the supply of the others. An over-supply
of an element, especially nitrogen, is hardly less injurious and will
actually lessen the yield of fruit though it may increase the size of
the vine. Not only must the food be in right proportions but in such
condition as to be readily available. Tomato roots have little power to
wrest plant food from the soil. The use of coarse, unfermented manure is
even more unsatisfactory with this than with other crops. The enormous
yields sometimes obtained by English gardeners from plan