SECRETARY'S REPORT. 127 



It will be seen that the sweet-scented vernal grass and the 

 meadov/ foxtail contain but 20 parts in 100, of dry, solid mat- 

 ter, while the yellow oat and the downy oat grasses contain 

 nearly double, or about 40 per cent. This difference, though 

 of no great importance in itself, is of some interest in showing 

 that to judge of «the quantity of hay a given burden of grass 

 will produce, it is necessary to consider the species of grass 

 which mainly composes the meadow, since it is evident that a 

 given weight of one variety might make double the quantity of 

 the same weight of another. 



But the chief interest of the table is to be found in columns 

 three, four and five. The albuminous or flesh forming princi- 

 ples will be found to be double in some instances what they are 

 in others ; and in accordance with the principles laid down in 

 the explanatory remarks which precede the tables, some would 

 appear to be more than twice as nutritive as others, but it should 

 be borne in mind that these differences depend in part on the 

 variations in the quantity of water, and that the real differences 

 will appear more apparent in the dried specimens. 



A glance at table VIII. will show that the percentage of 

 water in the artificial grasses as taken from the field, is greater 

 than that of the natural grasses under the same circumstances. 

 The percentage of albuminous or flesh forming principles is 

 generally, though by no means uniformly, less than that of our 

 best grasses. Compare red clover, for instance, with Timothy, 

 and the first striking peculiarity is the difference in the amount 

 of water, in the one case exceeding 81 per cent., leaving but 

 19 per cent, of solid matter from which the flesh forming and 

 other nutritive substances must be drawn, while in Timothy 

 the water amounts to only little over 57 per cent., leaving 43 

 per cent, of solid substances containing nutritive principles. 

 This is an important difference to begin with. The percentage 

 of flesh forming principles of the two plants does not, at first 

 sight, appear to differ very materially, the clover containing 

 4.27 the Timothy 4.86 ; but a little consideration of the exceed- 

 ing value of this constituent, will show that the latter has an 

 important advantage in this respect over the clover. In fat- 

 forming principles, the Timothy is more than twice as rich as 

 clover, while in heat-producing principles — also very valuable — 

 Timothy far surpasses clover, the one producing 22.85 percent., 



