670 Transformation of Oats into Rye. 



minute, in order to breathe out the air inhaled from the wa- 

 ter; and generally floats just beneath the surface, or with a 

 small portion of the back raised above it; and I have never 

 yet seen it manifest any inclination to bury itself in the sand. 

 If the animal live through the winter, I will communicate 

 any further observations I may make on its habits, provided 

 you think them worthy a place in your Magazine. 



I remain, My dear Sir, 



Yours very truly, 



Thomas Bradley. 



Royal Gallery of Practical Science, 

 Adelaide St., Nov. 20th, 1838. 



Editor of the Mag. Nat. Hist. 



Art. VI. — On the Transformation of Oats into Rye. By 

 W. Weissenborn, Ph. D. 



I ventured, some time ago, to bring this subject before the 

 English public, promising, at the same time, that I would 

 communicate in the 1 Mag. Nat. Hist.' the results of new ex- 

 periments which were then about to be made in various pla- 

 ces m this country, and by scientific men. I have now an 

 opportunity of giving further publicity to fresh testimony in 

 favour of this anomalous transformation, and which comes 

 from a quarter that may be thought entitled to the attention 

 of the most incredulous. It is taken from the last annual re- 

 port of the Agricultural Society of Coburg, and runs thus : — 

 "With reference to the transformation of oats into rye, 

 which has been first observed in this neighbourhood by Lieu- 

 tenant Colonel de Schauroth, and afterwards by other mem- 

 bers of our society, this remarkable phenomenon has not on- 

 ly been verified by new experiments, but we have caused 

 again beds to be sown with oats, in order that we may be 

 able to convince all disbelievers, by sending them, at their 

 request, rye-stalks which spring from a caudex that still shows 

 the withered leaves of the oat-plant of the foregoing year. 

 We repeat, that this transformation takes place if the oats be 

 sown veiy late (about midsummer's-day) and cut twice as 

 green fodder before shooting into flower-stalks, whereupon a 

 considerable number of the oat-plants do not die in the course 

 of the winter, but are changed in the following spring into 

 rye, forming stalks which cannot be known from those of the 

 finest winter-rye. The society must expect that this fact will 

 be considered by many as a mere assertion, nay, there are 



