260 BOARD OF AGRlCULTtTRi:. 



should condemn the Prolific from the first trials of it in 

 autumn, for it is one of those potatoes that becomes more 

 faiinaceous as the winter advances. In common with many 

 others we were sadly disappointed in our first crop, as the 

 quality was by no means equal to the samples we had tried 

 the previous spring, but as tlie winter wore away, the Pro- 

 lifics improved, and we finally decided that if they had been 

 called Supreme instead of Prolific, the name would have been 

 more consonant with their nature, for we know of no potato 

 that is superior to them in the last of the season. But the 

 potato that is both prolific and excellent is Mr. Breese's 

 Peerless. It is the coming potato for a general crop if it is safe 

 to prophecy this much of any man or any potato. The Peer- 

 less is pronounced on all hands excellent in quality, and as to 

 its productiveness we know nothing equal to it. On good 

 ground it yields four hundred, five hundred, and even six 

 hundred bushels to the acre, all large, some of them too 

 large. We have weighed those that brought down the steel- 

 yards at three pounds, and have heard of those that weighed 

 four pounds, but notwithstanding this enormous size they are 

 not coarse nor hollow hearted. We do not consider this great 

 size a recommendation of the Peerless, but it is encouraging 

 when there has been so much croaking about "small potatoes 

 and few in a hill," that we can raise again large crops of 

 large potatoes. It proves that if consumption had ever 

 fastened upon this vegetable that the disease is pretty much 

 cured. It is but justice however that we should say that wo 

 found last summer a few rotten Peerless potatoes, when the 

 Eose, Prolifics, Garnets and Colebook Seedlings, growing in 

 similar soil and with similar cultivation, were perfectly sound. 

 The defect of too great size, if it may be called a defect, may 

 he remedied by selecting year after year medium sized pota- 

 toes for seed. In the same manner the inclination which the 

 Peerless manifests to grow irregularly, projecting a tumor 

 here and another tumor on top of the first, may be cured in 

 the process of time by planting only those potatoes that are 

 smooth and of good form. 

 This leads us to say that farmers are not generally careful 



