a half broad, and seven inches in
depth. Let each box be half filled with manure in the form of fresh
horse-dung from the stables, the fresher the better, but if wet, it
should be allowed to dry for three or four days before it is put into
the boxes. When the manure has been placed in the box it should be
well beaten down. After the second or third day, if the manure has
begun to generate heat, break each brick of mushroom spawn (which may
be obtained from any seedsman) into pieces about three inches square,
then lay the pieces about four inches apart upon the surface of the
manure in the box; here they are to lie for six days, when it will
probably be found that the side of the spawn next to the manure has
begun to run in the manure below; then add one and a half inch more of
fresh manure on the top of the spawn in the box, and beat it down as
formerly. In the course of a fortnight, when you find that the spawn
has run through the manure, the box will be ready to receive the mould
on the top; this mould must be two and a half inches deep, well beaten
down, and the surface made quite even. In the space of five or six
weeks the mushrooms will begin to come up; if the mould then seems
dry, give it a gentle watering with lukewarm water. The box will
continue to produce from six weeks to two months, if duly attended to
by giving a little water when dry, for the mushrooms need neither
_light_ nor _free air_. If cut as button mushrooms each box will yield
from twenty-four to forty-eight pints, according to the season and
other circumstances. They may be kept in dry dark cellars, or any
other places where the frost will not reach them. By preparing in
succession of boxes, mushrooms may be had all the year through.--They
may be grown without the manure, and be of a finer flavour. Take a
little straw, and lay it carefully in the bottom of the mushroom box,
about an inch thick, or rather more. Then take some of the spawn
bricks and break them down--each brick into about ten pieces, and lay
the fragments on the straw, as close to each other as they will lie.
Cover them up with mould three and a half inches deep, and well
pressed down. When the surface appears dry give a little tepid water,
as directed for the mode of raising them described above, but this
method needs about double the quantity of water that the former does,
owing to having no moisture in the bott