(_b_) Gather the beans when young, and in dry weather. Have ready a brown earthenware pan or crock holding about ½ basket, and when the beans have been gathered string and cut them as if for immediate use; cover the bottom of the crock well with salt--the coarse kind used for pickling pork--add a layer of French beans, well cover them with salt, then add layers of beans and of salt alternately until the crock is full; tie it down with thick brown paper, keep it in a cool cellar where it is not too dry, and by Christmas the beans will be ready for use. It is not necessary to have sufficient beans at one time to fill the crock, provided care is taken to cover the last layer with plenty of salt. To prepare them for use during the winter, take out of the crock as many as are wanted for immediate use, put them in a pan, and pour enough hot (but not boiling) water over them to cover them (the salt will then fall to the bottom), lift out the beans, and put them into fresh hot water 3 or 4 times, allowing them to remain in each water ¾-1 hour, then boil them in the ordinary way. A pinch of soda carbonate in the water they are boiled in gives them the bright green colour they have when fresh gathered. Towards the end of the winter they require ¼-½ hour’s extra boiling, as the salt is apt to make them hard. Keep the crock tied down between the times of using the beans. By attention to these rules they will remain good till the following May or June. Gooseberries and Currants.--Bushes of both these in the open quarter may be matted up when the fruit is ripe, and it will keep, under ordinarily favourable conditions, till November; but by far the best plan is to grow the trees against a north wall, where they may be kept till late in the season with little trouble. Grapes.--(_a_) Many people are deterred from adopting the very useful plan of keeping late grapes in bottles of water, from the idea that some elaborately fitted up or air-tight compartment is necessary; but this is by no means the case, as, with a little contrivance, a good grape room may be extemporised in any compartment enclosed with 4 brick walls. The principal point is to get a steady temperature, that would not be liable to sudden fluctuations: and for this reason a room with a northern aspect is desirable, or, what is better still, an apartment that does not communicate directly with the outside air. The advantage of having the grapes thus securely bottled, when severe frosts and sunshine render it impossible to maintain the houses in which they were grown at anything like an equable temperature after the beginning of the year, can only be fully realised by those who have had to keep them on the vines until late in spring, besides the benefit which the vines derive by being released of their crop and pruned, cleaned, &c., at the most favourable period.