426 State Board of Agriculture, &c. 



call "sportiiii^,'" wherein like does ;?o?f produce like. Oth- 

 ers, again, may have been at first only modifications of the 

 ordinary type, effected by peculiar external conditions, which 

 divergence may afterwards have been increased and made 

 permanent by selection and high culture. But here I must 

 record my conviction that many, if not most of these new 

 varieties of grain are not new except with respect to the 

 place in which tliey come to notice. They are old varieties 

 estray, by some chance, from remote quarters, it may Ije, of 

 the globe, older, perhaps, than the nations which they have 

 nourished, propagating themselves for years in obscurity, 

 migrating hither and thither in numerous ways, until picked 

 up at last by some enterprising cultivator, carefully fostered, 

 and sent forth with a new name. 



The instances where man, though he possesses in cross fer- 

 tilization the means of producing new varieties at will, has 

 made use of this means to accomplish any definite good, are 

 extremely rare. Although myself engaged in such experi- 

 ments, I must confess that I know of but one other simi- 

 larly employed, my friend and correspondent, Charles Ar- 

 nold, of Paris, Province of Ontario, who lias addressed him- 

 self, with eminent success, to the crossing and re-crossing of 

 wheat (always winter wheat, I believe), and has produced 

 varieties which mo3t with much favor in cultivation. 



A wide and deep interest has recently been shown hi agri- 

 cultural circles in England, in some experiments for the 

 improvement of wheat, carried on by Major F. F. Hallett, 

 of Kemp Town, by which quite astonishing results have 

 been attained by selection associated with high cultivation. 

 In one case, commencing in 1859 with an ordinary variety, 



