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pected: a well ripened crop, enabling the farmer to pay his rent; and a wholesome nutriment being brought into the market. Ten or Twelve years ago, a very beautiful looking crop was sacrificed in the following manner. It was about the period, that a good deal was written and circulated, respecting the great advantages to be derived, from cutting wheat, while the grain was not fully ripened, as a means of considerably increasing the quantity of meal.

It was therefore reaped in an almost green state, while the thumb nail could be pressed through the grain, the consequence was, that it shrivelled, and I imagine never dried, for when it was ground into meal, and prepared for baking, the dough would not rise, and the bread it produced was so heavy (absolutely lead-like, and indigestible,) that it was unfit for ordinary human stomachs, and nearly the whole crop was given to the pigs.

It will not answer to run into extremes, in farming, all beginners should deviate from the usual practice with caution, and commence with small experiments, which when established to be on correct principles, can be extended with safety.

CHAPTER XI.

ON THE DISPOSITION OF WHEAT, TO SPORT.

HAVING doubted the general tendency of wheat to degenerate, I will now endeavour to shew how such an accident may occur. From careful observation,

it appears that some varieties if sown the same day, differ in their period of flowering, many days: even ten or twelve intervening. Hence a farmer who might be desirous of cultivating two or three sorts on his farm, by attending to this circumstance, would scarcely stand a chance of intermixing his crop: as fecundation could only take place at the time, that each variety blooms.

He might further increase the difference of the period, by sowing the earliest kind on the warmest exposition. Where the varieties flowered at the same period, there would certainly be danger of alteration in a future crop. The knowledge of the period of blooming of every variety should therefore become a science.

It is very extraordinary that some sub-varieties, (they should be called,) have a predisposition to sport, or to alter their appearance. A fine red sort No. 7,

in the original experiment, (see the first table,) was sown with the others, pure apparently, but to my great surprise, even to that of Professor La Gasca, who witnessed the whole arrangement of it, and classed the sub-varieties himself, out of three hundred and fifty ears, the produce of forty six grains, there were two hundred of the original sort, which were a red compact hoary or velvetty kind, twenty one ears of a smooth red, eighty six of a whitish downy appearance, and forty three smooth chaffed white ears. It might be conjectured that the original or parent ear, having been discovered in a field of mixed white corn, had been impregnated by the pollen of four different sorts of wheat, which the peculiar conformation of an ear of wheat might admit. Professor La Gasca classed the original sort as a seedling.

Another instance of this propensity to sport, I found in a Kentish downy seedling of an unusually square compact form, bearing a fine white plump round grain. I was anxious to propagate this, as it appeared so close and compact in its form, that the wind was not likely to have much power on it; it was accordingly sown in 1833, but I had the mortification to find, that it produced a great number of smooth ears; though there was little difference [in the appearance of the grain; I therefore set that produce aside, and tried to raise it from a single ear

again in 1834, but from 72 grains, whereof 13 diedeight ears were of a smooth sort, so that I considered it incorrigible, and have withdrawn it as a subvariety, constantly liable to change.

The Talavera, flowering much earlier than any other, is sure to continue pure, unless stray grains happen to be accidentally mixed with it. No. 1, which I call Jersey Dantzic, flowers ten days later, and is very little disposed to change; I suspect, the taller wheats are not liable to be impregnated, by the shorter sorts, but the contrary to be the case. It is of consequence therefore to endeavour to keep all those varieties, which are found to answer the purpose required, as far apart from each other as possible.

One sort that I grew close to some others, in the course of experiments, so far from having any affinity for them, actually exhibited a sort of dislike or shrinking, from some of its neighbours; it occurred in a very rare sort, of spring wheat, bearing white grains (most spring wheats bearing liver coloured dark grains) this absolutely took a curve, even contrary to the prevailing winds, from a winter wheat planted fourteen inches to its left, and bent towards some rows of spring wheat which were on its right, this last, another variety, showing no predilection, or dislike, towards either of its neighbours. Hence I am led to imagine, that from some unknown deli

cacy of habit, it loathed as it were the neighbourhood of the winter wheat, and leaned towards its summer neighbour. This was the more remarkable as the periods of flowering of the summer and winter wheats, were not the same. I therefore conclude, spring wheat may be sown with perfect safety by the side of winter wheat, without any fear of intermixture.

I hold it to be of paramount importance, to ascertain, and keep a note of the period of flowering of each variety to be cultivated, on extensive farms, which will tend more to the keeping up a pure sort than any other method, care being taken also to cause the barn to be well swept, as each sort is finally disposed of.

It may be of no small importance, to be able to sow spring and winter wheats at the same time, for it must be clearly understood that many spring wheats will stand the winter, as well as winter wheats, and as they would then invariably flower at different periods, it would be a certain mode of ensuring pure crops; besides attaining another essential object, that of having flour of a moist nature, from the spring wheat, to mix with the dryer flour of the winter variety.

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