In France the cauliflower has been crossed artificially with cabbage, turnip and rutabaga, in the attempt to obtain varieties of greater hardiness. Numerous peculiar forms were the result of these crosses, some of which were good cauliflowers, said to be of increased hardiness, but none of them have found their way into general cultivation. One of these, owing to a cross with the turnip, acquired the flavor of that vegetable. A full account of these crosses may be found in the _Revue Horticole_ for 1880. The following remarks, by Mr. A. Dean, of England, on a case of apparent crossing in the cabbage tribe will be read with interest: "A very pretty conical-headed plant of a Colewort was allowed to run to seed, but nothing else of the same family was known to be in flower for a distance of at least several hundred yards. The produce was saved and sown, and has been furnishing food for the table during the past winter, but what a progeny! Some were reproductions of the seed parent, but larger, and proved very handsome early cabbages; others were very fair Coleworts; others bad examples of Cottager's Purple Kale, others Green Kale, while others resembled sprouting Broccoli, both green and purple. One plant was an example of the once popular Dalmany sprouts, and there were many other plants that admitted of no classification. It is probable that bees, which travel long distances, had somewhere found some sprouting in Broccoli flower and had brought pollen from those to the Colewort plant in question." Spontaneous variation has given a number of curious forms of cauliflower, including one with several heads in the place of one, and another in which the head is flattened sidewise, like the garden cockscomb. These forms have not been cultivated. Cauliflower seed contains on an average about 7,000 seeds to the ounce, of which about one-half usually germinate, a much smaller per cent. than in cabbage. Long Island growers estimate two ounces of seed to the acre as a safe amount for the small varieties and an ounce and a half for the late varieties. It was formerly a common belief, especially in England, that old seed would be most likely to produce good heads. There is little evidence to support this belief, and just as little ground for the more recent belief held by some that old seed is particularly liable to produce loose worthless heads. Like all other seed cauliflower seed ought to be as fresh as possible; fresh seed always germinates best and gives the most vigorous plants. Seed two or three years old, however, is generally satisfactory, and it will often grow successfully at double that age. "CAULIFLOWER SEED GROWING ON PUGET SOUND." By H. A. March, Fidalgo Island, Puget Sound, Washington, in _Rural New Yorker_, 1888.