New Zealand Spinach, Tetra-gonia expansa, is much admired as a substitute for summer spinach, being of more delicate flavor, and not so liable to run to seed. Mr. J. Anderson, gardener to the Earl of Essex, at Cassio-bury, Herts, gives the following directions for its cultivation: -

"Sow in the seed-vessel as gathered the preceding autumn, at the latter end of March in a pot, and placed in a melon frame. The seedlings to be pricked while small singly into pots, to be kept under a frame without bottom heat, until the third week in May, or until the danger of frost is past. The bed for their reception is formed by digging a trench two feet wide and one deep, this being tilled with thoroughly decayed dung, and covered six inches deep with mould. A space of at least three feet must be left vacant for the extension of the branches. Twenty plants will afford an abundant supply daily for a large family; they must be planted three feet apart.

"In dry seasons they probably require a large supply of water. In five or six weeks after planting, the young leaves may be gathered from them, these being pinched off. The leading shoot must be carefully preserved, for the branches are productive until a late period of the year, as they survive the frosts that kill nasturtiums and potatoes".

To Obtain Seed

For the production of seed, a plantation must be made on a poorer soil, or kept stunted and dry in pots, as ice plants are when seed is required of them. On the rich compost of the bed, the plants become so succulent as to prevent the production of seed. This vegetable has not proved, in the United States, worthy of its European reputation - probably owing to the intense heat of our Bummers.