sing of well-rotted manure, ashes or
commercial fertilizer that I want to use. I never regret going over the
field again, if by so doing I can improve its condition in the least. On
a lighter soil it might be better to compact rather than loosen as much
as would give the best results with clay, but always and everywhere the
soil should be made fine, friable and uniform in condition, to the
greatest depth possible.

One of the most successful growers has said that if he could afford to
spend but two days' time on a patch of tomatoes he would use a day and a
half of the two days in fitting the ground before he set the plants. It
is my opinion that any working of the ground that serves to get it into
better mechanical condition, if done economically, will not only
increase the yield, but to such an extent as to lower the cost a bushel.
T. B. Terry's teaching of the necessity for working and re-working the
soil, if one would have the largest crops of potatoes of the best
quality, is even more applicable to the culture of tomatoes.

=Home garden.=--Here there is no excuse for setting plants in hard,
lumpy soil. It should be worked and re-worked, not simply once or twice,
but once or twice after it has been thoroughly worked. In short, the
tomato bed should be made as friable as it is possible to make it and to
as great a depth as the character of the sub-soil will permit.

=Under glass.=--I would strongly advise that soil for tomatoes, whether
it is to be used in solid beds or in pots or boxes, be thoroughly
sterilized by piling it not over 15 inches deep or wide over iron pipes
perforated with two lines of holes about one-sixteenth inch in diameter
and 2 inches apart and filled with steam for at least a half hour. It
can be sterilized, but far less effectively, by thorough wetting with
boiling water. It should always be well stirred and aired before the
plants are set in it.

=Starting plants.=--From about the latitude of New York city southward,
it is possible to secure large yields from plants grown from seed sown
in place in the field, and one often sees volunteer plants which have
sprung up as weeds carrying as much or more fruit than most carefully
grown transplanted ones beside them. In many sections tomatoes are grown
in large areas for canning factories, and as a farm rather than a market
garden crop, individual farmers planting from 10 to 100 acres; and to
start and transplant to the field the 25,000 to 30,000 p