The white is merely ornamental. The large purple is one of the greatest luxuries of the vegetable garden. Plant seeds in hotbed at the time of planting tomatoes or peppers. Set out in land made very rich with stable-manure and decayed forest-leaves, two feet and a half apart each way. Kept clean, and earthed up a little, and the bugs kept off while the plants are small, they will produce an abundance of fruit. There are two varieties of the purple--_large prickly-stem purple_, growing sometimes eight inches in diameter; and the _long purple_, bearing smaller, long fruit, but a large quantity, and considerably earlier than the large. Many do not like them at first; but after tasting a few times, almost all persons become very fond of them. If not properly cooked, they are not at all palatable. Although it belongs to the cook-book, yet, to save this excellent plant from condemnation, we give a recipe for cooking it. It is fit for use from one third grown, until the seeds begin to turn. Without paring, cut the fruit into slices one third of an inch thick; put it in a little water with plenty of salt, and let it stand over night, or six hours at least; take it out, and fry very soft and brown in butter or fresh lard--if not fried soft and brown, it is disagreeable. Salt, ashes, and bonedust, or superphosphate of lime, are the best manures, as more than two thirds of the fruit is made up of potash, soda, and phosphates, as shown by chemical analysis. EGGS. Of the quality of eggs you can always judge correctly by looking at them toward the light: if they are translucent they are good; if they look dark they are old--or you may get a chicken, when you only paid for an egg. Many methods for preserving eggs are recommended. Packed away in fine salt they will keep, but, like salt meat, have not the same flavor as fresh. Set them on their small ends in a tight cask, and fill it with pure lime-water, and they will keep, but it changes their flavor. This, however, is a very common method. The best way known to us, is to pack fresh eggs down in Indian meal, allowing no two to touch each other. Keep very dry in a cool cellar, and they will remain for months unchanged. ELDERBERRY. This is a healthy berry, dried and used for making pies, especially mixed with some other fruit. The blossoms are much used as medicine for small children. The common sweet elder is the only kind cultivated. The earlier red are offensive and poisonous. They are easily grown on rough waste land, or in any situation you prefer. Of this berry is made a wine, superior in flavor and effect to any port wine now to be obtained in market; it has had the preference among the best judges in the country;--it is fast coming into notice and cultivation. The wine is so entirely superior to the poisonous substances of that name in commerce, that it would be well for every neighborhood to make enough for their sick. The process is sure and easily intelligible to all. (See article Wine.)