1^^^-] SoYglo Sucre—Sweet Millet. 



•->< 



Bu^\n Sttcrr-Stout millet. 



lNAS3iurH as the agriculture of the country should bestow, as we 

 think, more atteiition to our forage crops, we deem all the information 

 that we can collect on this subject to be of importance f.o the interests 

 of agriculture. 



Under this view we now submit the following statements in relation 

 to the Sweet Millet, sometimes called the "Chinese sugar cane'' 

 with the suggestion that this may become an essential prodtet among 

 our forage staples. We therefore bespeak for this Asiatic stranger a 

 fair trial of its merits, and trust that the experiments made wfth it 

 will be accurately communicated to our agricultural papers. 



J. C. Orth's Report. 

 The following report was read at the last meeting of the Wabash 

 County Agricultural Society, and was ordered to be published. 



I deem it my duty, as a member of your society, as well as the duty 

 which one citizen owes to community, to report, as far as succes<^fnl 

 experiments enable me, my efforts to cultivate new seeds, some of 

 which I obtained by means of private correspondence, and others 

 through the Patent Office, and in behalf of your society. 



The first seeds which this society obtained from the Patent Office for 

 distribution among its members were obtained in the winter of 1855 

 and comprised a list of twenty-one varieties, with the cultivation of 

 some of which most farmers were familiar, but there were also some, 

 of the culture and care of which nothing was known, and in conse- 

 qence all attempts to cultivate were necessarily experimental. 



Among the latter class was the Sorgho Sucre or Sugar Millet a 

 gramineous plant, imported by the Patent Office from France, and im- 

 ported into France from the north of China, some five years since 

 Mr. D J. Brown, the agent of the Patent Office, in his report upon 

 this plant, says, -he was led to infer that, from the peculiarities of 

 the climate, and its resemblance in appearance and habits to Indian 

 corn, It would flourish in any region wherever that plant would thrive " 

 My experience fully proves Mr. Brown's judgment correct, ^yhen the 

 seed was obtained, nothing was known of it, and no one seemed willing 

 to plant it on trial; bearing the name of millet, it was supposed to be 

 quite a different plant from that which it turned out to be. About the 

 middle of May I planted all the seed rec.iv. d, except one paper which 

 amounted to not exceeding on gill, on new upland, between Indian 



