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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



Thus, by means of repeated selection alone, the length of the ears 

 has been doubled, their contents nearly trebled, and the " tillering " 

 power of the seed increased fivefold. 



The following table gives similar increased contents of ear ob- 

 tained in three other varieties of wheat : 



It was supposed by ancient writers that the powers of grains dif- 

 fered in relation to their positions in the ear. This Major Hallett 

 investigated in 1858, by planting the grains of ten ears on a plan 

 showing their several positions in the ear. The only general result, 

 among most conflicting ones, was that the smallest grains, those most 

 remote from the center of growth, exhibited throughout, most unex- 

 pectedly, a vigor equal to that of the largest ; and that the remarked 

 w r orst grains, in one or two instances, did not by any means fall so 

 far short of the good ones as had been expected. Frequent trials have 

 also been made of the comparative power of large and small, plump 

 and thin grains, and, in the case of oats, which produce a small grain 

 attached to a large one, trials as to their respective powers with uni- 

 form results, viz., that, in good grains of the same pedigree, neither 

 mere size nor situation in the ear supplies any indication of the su- 

 perior grain. 



Very close observation during many years led to the discovery 

 that the variations in the cereals which Nature presents to us are 

 not only hereditary, but that they proceed upon a fixed principle, 

 and from them has been educed the following law of development of 

 cereals : 



1. Every fully-developed plant, whether of wheat, oats, or barley, 

 presents an ear superior in productive power to any of the rest on that 

 plant. 



2. Every such plant contains one grain which, upon trial, proves 

 more productive than any other. 



3. The best grain in a given plant is found in its best ear. 



