Johnny had exactly five shillings a-week, paid in full every Friday evening, from his employer, for Johnny never had time to be sick, far less to be drunk, and always avoided broken days, by contriving in-door work, at Mr B.’s, in wet weather; his wife, who had two children, washed occasionally for a neighbour’s family, thus adding two shillings and sixpence each week to their income, and the contribution of additional suds to the dunghill; but in other respects they had no advantage over other labourers. Their own little garden added greatly to the support of the family, by judicious cropping and excellent management. Johnny had every year some drills of very early ash-leaved potatoes put down in January, if possible, which he either sold at a very high price in summer at a neighbouring town, or consumed as he found most economical; and his early sowing of potatoes was far better than the more common practice of the Irish cottier, who leaves his garden uncropped with them until March or April, with the view of obtaining a more abundant crop (but of inferior quality) at a late season, when they might be purchased at a mere trifle, and that, too, without the advantage of a second crop of any description to succeed them. Johnny had too much sense for this: he began to dig his dish of potatoes for dinner in the first or second week in July, when his neighbours were half starving, or paying exorbitantly for oatmeal and old potatoes; and as he dug out his crop, he either sowed turnips, with a little ashes and a sprinkling of dung, or planted borecole for the winter; generally he had some of both, for he found turnips good for his own table in winter, and profitable for the support of some poultry, of which I shall take notice soon. He had also every variety of common kitchen vegetables in small patches, continually changing places, and thus improving the soil; he had, besides, two hives of bees; and for the sake of the _straw_, as well as for rotation, and the support of his pig and poultry, a little rye, vetches, or clover. Johnny, however, only worked in the garden in the evening, after his ordinary day’s work, or, in summer, at sunrise; yet there never was a weed to be seen in it, for they never had time to grow: by using the hoe for a few moments now and then, they were always kept down, and every waste blade and briar and useless sod around the hedge which enclosed it, was carefully pared and burnt for manure.