With the comparative leisure of winter, is it not well to take a retrospective glance at what has been accomplished; to be pleased with what has been well done, and to compare notes of what is in progress - Horticulturally of course - your Journal being the vade mecum for that subject.

The season has been one of great fruitful-nessj the granaries of the industrious farmer are richly stored with all the cereal and other crops, both in quantity and quality, and the horticulturist's heart has gladdened at the profusion and richness of the bounties set before him. Never, within the recollection o the oldest inhabitant, has there been such an unilents have been excellent; and bating the occasional loss by insect depredations, and a touch of a nameless blight, all have reaped a quid pro quo for labor bestowed. For one, I can truly say, that it has been a season of peculiar pleasure and satisfaction, although physical labor has been more severe than for forty years before.

Permit me, in usus loquendi, to say a word or two to those who like myself have been

Pent up in cities' murky gloom, Breathing infection, and to lure them into rural places, where alone can health and cheerful mind attain the acme of God's paradise on earth.

For several years past my passion for gardening has been confined within narrow bounds. Fruits, flowers, vinery and conservatory, have occupied but a few perches of land. Lately, having purchased a suburban residence of some five and twenty acres, within two miles of the city, I have, thanks to a kind providence, learned to walk again - aye, and to work too - enjoying the elastic influences of healthful exercise, with the accessories of a sound and natural appetite. Here we enjoy the luxuries of homemade butter, fresh eggs, wholesome and nutritious vegetables, luscious fruits, and a happy thankfulness that onr lot has been thus cast in pleasant places.

My lands had once been in a high state of cultivation, but for some years past most shamefully abused. Burdock, and a host of mongrel grasses, weeds, grubs, etc. had taken possession. The trees were mossy, and had been starved into bare existence. What a picture! • and yet, who would not envy my position? Believe me, and I doubt not you would respond to the truth, that to create, to replant, and to rejuvenate such a place, watching grateful earth put forth her latent energies; to guide and direct each branch and twig, and turn the neglected sward into velvet lawn, is productive of far greater happiness to the lover of rural labors, than the possession of a finished place, where nought was left to do.

Most fortunately the soil, which varies from sandy loam to a stiff clay, had never been stirred beyond the depth of a few inches, and my

Intending to appropriate the larger portion of the plot to fruit culture, the first instrument purchased was a subsoil plow. This tool strikes at the root of all evil, and has, wherever used, done wonders. As Rome was not built in a day - for want of time - neither have I subsoiled all my land; yet desirous of testing the efficacy of each experiment, I applied it to alternate lands, and with the aid of the common plow, I have thoroughly worked several acres, from 17 to 20 inches in depth. Thus, with the design of getting the soil in good heart and tilth before planting, I put in root and hoed crops.

The surface was manured in this wise: - 50 loads stable manure, 10 loads leached ashes, 10 loads limed hair from the tannery, and 100 bushels rectified charcoal per acre - all of which was well and thoroughly incorporated to the depth of eight or ten inches, with a scattering of air slaked lime upon the surface; the latter more particularly to meet the appetite of the grubs. The result has been, that potatoes, corn, cabbage, carrots and oats, were in weight, as two to one in favor of the subsoiled land. These crops never showed the least wilt in drouth, nor lost color until the ripening process.

How little is known of the true value of this limed hair and refuse charcoal - articles readily procured in large quantities, in nearly every town, for the carting, and which are frequently buried in sunken holes to get rid of them. I consider the hair nearly as rich in the same constituents as ground bones, (which, with us, are very expensive,) containing largely, nitrogen and ammonia, besides being rich in phosphates, and withal readily decomposing, not a vestige being left in its former state at the close of a season. For grape and fruit culture generally, it is invaluable.

Of charcoal, enough has been said through the pages of the Horticulturist, to assure the most skeptical of its intrinsic virtue. But, says a novice, your charcoal is ruined by the uses to which it has been applied; in rectifying spirit, it is so perfectly changed by the absorption of the essential oil, that it has lost all power of farther absorbtion as a deodoriser? This is nonsense in the extreme. Charcoal is indestrucexperiments in disinfecting night-soil, and fetid chamber slops, in warm weather, I find it puts a quietus npon the odors most perfectly - and for this purpose fully equal to fresh burned coal. Try it, ye skeptics, who profess to delight in rich foliage and luxuriant growth.

Wood ashes, leached or fresh, is another invaluable auxiliary to the tiller of the soil; and remarkable is it, that the farmer and gardener will, even now, sell his ashes at a few cents a bushel, in exchange for soap, at a loss of a thousand per cent! As a single fertilizer for tree culture, it is the most valuable of any.

In my orchard of an hundred rather old apple trees, whose beauty had departed, and whose fruit was bitter, and miserably poor, I have already wrought a favorable change. Around each tree the soil has been trenched, two feet deep by two feet wide, at from six to eight feet from the bole; the roots cut off smoothly with a well ground spade, and the trench filled with a compost of chopped sod, hair, leached ashes and chip manure, well incorporated, scattering the soil taken out upon the surface. The trees were then somewhat pruned and grafted; the loose bark and moss carefully scraped away, and a wash of whale oil soap, sulphur and sand, put freely upon them. The grafts took well, the trees put on a new dress, and already have they assumed a healthful vigor. What they will attain by another season's growth, we can readily imagine. This orchard was well manured, deeply plowed, and put into potatoes which turned out well.