that quite different wheats than the English ought to be experimented upon for obtaining prolific varieties; namely, the quickly-growing Norwegian wheat, the Jersey “three months’ wheat,” or even Yakutsk barley, which matures with an astonishing rapidity. And now that horticulturists, so experienced in “breeding” and “crossing” as Vilmorin, Carter, Sherif, W. Saunders in Canada and many others are, have taken the matter in hand, we may feel sure that future progress will be made. But breeding is one thing; and the planting wide apart of seeds of an appropriate variety of wheat is quite another thing.
This last method was lately experimented upon by M. Grandeau, Director of the Station Agronomique de l’Est, and by M. Florimond Dessprèz at the experimental station of Capelle; and in both cases the results were most remarkable. At this last station a method which is in use in France for the choice of seeds was applied. Already now some French farmers go over their wheat fields before the crop begins, choose the soundest plants which bear two or three equally strong stems, adorned with long ears, well stocked with grains, and take these ears. Then they crop off with scissors the top and the bottom of each ear and keep its middle part only, which contains the biggest seeds. With a dozen quarts of such selected grains they obtain next year the required quantity of seeds of a superior quality.92
The same was done by M. Dessprèz. Then each seed was planted separately, eight inches apart in a row, by means of a specially devised tool, similar to the rayonneurwhich is used for planting potatoes; and the rows, also eight inches apart, were alternately given to the big and to the smaller seeds. One-fourth part of an acre having been planted in this way, with seeds obtained from both early and late ears, crops corresponding to 83.8 bushels per acre for the first series, and 90.4 bushels for the second series, were obtained; even the small grains gave in this experiment as much as 70.2 and 62 bushels respectively.93
The crop was thus more than doubled by the choice of