It is very important that seed of only the best kind should be used, if we would grow vegetables of superior quality. Every gardener of experience will indorse the truth of this statement.
Said one amateur gardener to me when I gave him this advice: "Why should one be so particular about the seed? It's the culture that you give the plant that counts. Plant any kind of seed that happens to be handiest and take good care of the plants that grow from it and you'll have good vegetables." To some extent what he said was true, but he had yet to learn that there is a vast difference between ordinary seed and seed that has bred into it by careful culture the superior qualities which characterize the choicest varieties of all our garden plants. There is such a thing as aristocracy of seed, and no seed that is lacking in this feature can be expected to afford the satisfaction that results from the use of the best. No amount of culture can make a superior vegetable from plants grown from inferior seed. Bear this in mind, and buy only the best seed on the market, be your garden large or small. The smaller it is, the greater the importance of using only the best.
"But how are we who know very little about such things to know which is the best?" some one may ask.
The only answer I can make to this question is this: We have in this country many seed firms that have been in existence for years—some of them over half a century—and these have built up for themselves a reputation for handling only seed of the very best varieties of garden vegetables that it is possible to grow. Inferior sorts have been discarded from time to time as those of superior merit have been produced. These firms, proud and jealous of the reputation they have gained, cannot afford to deal in anything that is not up to their standard of "the best." From these dealers you can be sure of getting seed that can always be depended on to give the highest degree of satisfaction. The seed they sell you may cost a little more than some of the newer dealers ask for theirs, but the certainty of getting what you want makes it well worth while to invest some extra money in it. Cheap seed—that which is advertised as being "just as good as higher-priced seed for a much smaller amount of money"—is likely to prove as cheap in quality as in price.
V
EARLY GARDEN WORK
After planting the garden there will be a little interval of leisure while the seed that has been put into the ground is germinating.
Then will come the time of early warfare with the weeds. Here is where the weeding-hook of which I have spoken will come into play in the small garden. This little implement is in the form of a claw, with five or six fingers, each about an inch long, and shaped so that they reach into the ground and take a firm hold of whatever plants they are placed over. It can be so operated that these fingers, working close to plants which it is not desired to uproot, will tear away the weeds without disturbing the other plants, and the soil will be left in light and mellow condition, as if a tiny rake had been drawn through it. With this tool the work can be done with great rapidity. No owner of a garden, large or small, can afford to be without it.