In selecting varieties choose those which are recommended as suitable for your soil, heavy or light, or such as have proved good in your immediate neighborhood, as some of the finest kinds are worthless in a different soil from that to which they are adapted. If especially fine, large berries are desired, the plants should be set in rows three feet apart, the plants twelve inches, as before, and all the runners kept cut off as fast as they appear. In this case heavy mulching is imperative, or the stools will be thrown out of the ground in the spring freezing and thawing. When the spring opens, the mulching should be cleared away from the crown of the plant, but should be allowed to remain on the ground surrounding the plant, as the weeds can easily be kept from such a patch, and fresh fertilizer applied. The patch may be continued in bearing for two or three seasons, but it will be found a great deal easier if a fresh patch is planted in new ground each year. COMPOST. This should be prepared in the early spring for use in the hills, and if it can be stacked in the fall and allowed to rot through the winter, it will be all the better. It can be composed of barnyard scrapings, well-rotted manure, chicken manure, night soil, or other strong fertilizer, mixed with at least an equal bulk of soil or ashes. This should be wet enough to rot thoroughly, but should not be allowed to lie exposed to the weather where its strength will leach away. When thoroughly mixed, I place it in old barrels under a shed and pour water on top of each barrel occasionally, to keep it rotting. MANURE. A good supply of manure should be either made or bought, as the garden should have a good dressing at least two years out of three; the third year I usually use a phosphate, but would use the manure if I could spare it, using also a good dressing of air-slaked lime every two or three years. The manner of applying the lime and phosphate is the same, but they must not be used the same season, as the lime will destroy the effect of the phosphate. They are sown on in the spring, after the ground has been plowed, and before harrowing, the harrow thoroughly mixing them with the soil. The supply of manure may be largely increased by pulling up the early peas, corn, cabbage stalks, etc., as fast as the crops are gathered, and adding them to the manure heap; this should be so located that all slops and waste from the house can be thrown upon it, so as to assist in keeping it constantly rotting; where corn stalks, tall weeds, etc., are put on the manure heap they should be cut into short lengths, with a corn cutter or other implement, to facilitate rotting and handling when the manure is drawn out. SAVING SEEDS.