97 



tests alone, may l)e, under certain couditions, advisable ; but as progress 

 is made it will doubtless be found that a relatively low-testing' mate- 

 rial may have a greater practical value than a higher-testing rival. 



Tests made at distant points should not be accepted without cor- 

 roborative trial. The Vilmorin beet was found unfit for use in Ger- 

 many owing to its relatively small crops. In Austria the experimental 

 results under Professor Maercker's own directions demonstrated that 

 this variety excelled not oidy in its percentage of sugar, but also in 

 weight of crop, and in all other respects. 



Varietal tests on a single farm have been severely criticised and with 

 good reason. The results above quoted illustrate anew the danger in 

 drawing conclusions from them. Comparing the different varieties bj' 

 the averages of all the tests of sugar content of each, the highest variety 

 was only 1.0 per cent above the lowest. But the different samples of 

 a single variety, all grown from the same stock of seed, varied from one 

 another by 3 per cent of sugar. In other words, differences due to soil, 

 climate, cultivation, etc., may exceed all differences properly attributed 

 to breeding and selection. For a fair comparison of varieties it is 

 necessary to make a large number of tests and find an approximation 

 to the truth in figures representing averages. 



Of the factors which will influence the introduction of the sugar in- 

 dustry in the United States, soil, climate, water, fuel, and labor are 

 matters of locality ; that is, they already exist in the right combination in 

 certain favored places. Machinery and seed, on the contrary, are depend- 

 ent upon human ingenuity, knowledge, and perseverance. Inventors, 

 draughtsmen, and mechanical engineers have simplified the question of 

 suitable machinery for both beet and sorghum sugar extraction and 

 have brought matters to a point where a halt can be called to await 

 improvements in other directions, noticeably in seed selection and in 

 field work upon growing crops. 



