Those who have small gardens and love to grow their own fruits and vegetables, have little idea how great is the advantage in having deep soil to grow them in. Not only can one get double the crop from the same ground, but the quality is vastly superior to that of vegetables raised in shallow ground. The old-time gardeners - the men of the spade and the digging fork - understood this matter thoroughly, and a good part of leisure time in winter was spent in trenching ground, as they termed it. To do this a trench would be opened about three feet wide and two deep, the earth taken out being wheeled to the end of the plot to be trenched so as to be on hand to fill in the last trench. The top soil - the upper spit or spade-full would be thrown off entirely, and the lower spit being simply dug up and suffered to remain the lower spit. The next trench of three feet wide would then be attacked, the surface spit being thrown on the lower spit of the first trench, the lower being loosened as before. In this way the ground would be loosened two feet deep without burying the surface soil. In former times this was hard work, because done wholly by the spade. Since the introduction of the digging-iork it is much easier, and double the work can be done in the same time.

But the competition of the plow and plenty of manure has so cheapened vegetables that few care to put this labor on ground - but those who want something extra nice and love to see everything growing beautifully, no matter how dry the summer season may be, will find much delight in a small piece of thoroughly deepened ground. This is the season to watch the effect of deep and shallow garden soil, and the lessons learned can be put into practice when the proper time arrives. Some things especially do so remarkably in deep soils, that one will hardly recognize them as the same plants.

Beans produce an enormous crop in deeply trenched soils, and are improved as much as any crop by surface manuring. We hope this method of fertilizing the soil will be extensively adopted for garden crops this season. Those who have not yet tried it will be surprised at the economy and beneficial results of the practice.

Peas for a fall crop may be sown. It is, however, useless to try them unless in a deeply trenched soil, and one that is comparatively cool in the hottest weather overhead, or they will certainly mildew and prove worthless. In England where the atmosphere is so much more humid than ours, they nevertheless have great difficulty in getting fall peas to go through free from mildew; and to obviate these drying and mildew-producing influences, they often plant them in deep trenches, made as for celery, and then are much more successful with them.

Besides the lessons we may draw from watching deep and shallow soils, there will be much profit in the study of manures, and especially in the culture of fruit trees.

The hints given in our flower garden department on pruning may be read with profit here also.