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THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE 



In the case of seeds proper, attention to change of place 

 and healthy condition of parentage is of gi'eat importance ; 

 yet defects here are not so communicable as in the case of 

 the continuation of life by cuttings of any kind — by tubers, 

 slips, grafts. A plant raised from tlie seed is, so far, a 

 new individual, often considerably different in variety; in 

 vegetables frequently, and in animals nearly always, of 

 mixed parentage : while in the countinuation of life (as in 

 the potato) by tubers, there is little or no change — no re- 

 novation, no admixture of parents, to correct defect in a 

 particular direction— only a sort of ripening of the tuber 

 to larger size and a greater abundance of pollen, leading, 

 it would seem, eventually to a degeneracy liable to disease, 

 and resembling old age. 



In the case of potatoes continued by tubers, I never 

 knew more than the above variation of the small seedling, 

 from infancy to matured size, and apparently to infirm old 

 age. The finest variety of the potato ever known — the 

 " Hollandische," which some sixteen years ago was through- 

 out Gei'many almost in universal use as a table potato, is 

 now, I believe, extinct. All of those I brought over to 

 Scotland were killed tlie fu'st season's planting by the 

 disease. The Perthshire reds, perhaps tlie next most de- 

 licious variety, have shared nearly tlie same fate. It is a 

 general rule that the most delicious varieties of our tubers 

 and fruits have the juices of the stem and leaves partak- 

 ing of the same quality, and are in consequence more 

 liable to animalcular attack, or infectious or putrid disease, 

 than those of harsher juices: tliose of mildest taste, being 

 farthest removed from the natural hardy species reared 

 under the law of competitive selection, are the first that 

 suffer. In the case of fruit, I have known a number of 

 instances of change of character take place in life con- 

 tinued by grafting, the change occurring in one branch of 

 the tree near the top (the trees had been grafted low down 

 near the ground), but without being able to discover the 

 cause. I have continued one of these new varieties by 

 grafting. 



Viewing the injury done to the cereal seeds and potato 

 tubers in England by the past vei^ unpropitious season, 

 and that the cereals and potatoes in the greatest part of 

 Scotland, where a better season and fine autumn brought 

 the seeds and tubers to a healthy perfecting, secured in 

 good order in the stack-yard and potato-bin, it would be 

 wise for the English farmer to procure seed of both from 

 Scotland. The central counties of Scotland, the Carse of 

 Gowrie, Strathmore, and Fife, have excellent oats and 

 potatoes of many of the most healthy and productive 

 varieties, the potatoes free from rot, and are able to sup- 

 ply a great part of England with good quality of seed. 

 The railways to the south, where the convej'ance for 

 several hundred miles will not be much above one pound 

 per ton, and by sea only half as much, gives every con- 

 veniency of transport. Scotland has always been famed 

 for oats as well as men. When the Scotchman took the 

 field as a soldier in former times, his provision was his bag 

 of oatmeal, ready at all times, with water or milk, to form a 

 nutritious and healthy food, and stood his ground pretty 

 well with this nutriment, claymore in hand, against all 

 assailants. Next to oats, rye appears to be the most nu- 

 tritious and wholesome cereal : wheat, barley, and rice come 

 next in succession. In lao part of Europe have I found 

 oats equal in quality to those of Scotland, and carried to 

 the south of England the quality continues its pre- 

 eminence for several sowings. 



In Germany I have followed the practice of greening the 

 potatoes for seed, which I had seen practised in England 

 fifty years ago. In the autumn, when taken up, I laid them 

 upon a dry exposed knoll, one potato thick, for some two 

 weeks, covering at night with mats if it threatened frost. 

 In being thus exposed, they were a little shrivelled as well 

 as greened. One day I laid out a quantity new taken from 

 the ground, alongside of what had been laid out ten days 



before. The night following turned oixt unexpectedly a 

 little frosty, and the potatoes having no cover, the whole 

 laid out the night before were soft next day when thawed, 

 while not one of those that had lain for ten days was 

 injured. The reason wherefore the frost did not affect those 

 greened seemed to be complex. From being a little 

 withered, the cells of the tuber not quite distended witli 

 fluid, the contained fluid in freezing and enlai-ging did not 

 burst the cells and destroy the organization of the tuber, 

 whilst it might be that the concentrated fluids were more 

 difficult to freeze. Life was also stronger in the greened 

 tuber : it would breathe more, and might thus generate as 

 much heat as would prevent the complete freezing, or the 

 temperature might be kept a little higher by the increased 

 strength of the unknown vital forces. From the blight 

 being at that time unknown, I had not an example 

 whether the produce of the greened withered seed with- 

 stood the disease better than what was not so treated. I only 

 knew that the greened brairded sooner and gi-ew better than 

 the ungreened. Tliis leads me to notice a means of pre- 

 venting the blight, stated in a late number of the Gardeners' 

 ChronicJi', said to have been discovei'cd by chance in 

 Eussia. A quantity of potatoes, very much withered from 

 being left lying tliin on a floor and forgotten, in con- 

 sequence of the allotted seed running out, were taken to 

 plant out the remainder of a field, although they were so 

 much withered, that it seemed folly to plant them. They, 

 however, grew, and the disease setting-in severely, this 

 remainder of the field escaped, while the rest were all 

 blighted. Much dependence is not to be placed upon this 

 one fact, as the exemption might be due to other causes ; 

 but the account further states, that the drying of the seed 

 process has been fuUowed in that country with marked 

 success as prevention of bUght. 



The blight in the dry countries of the Continent, except 

 in low damp river-silt land, or very moist weather, acts dif- 

 ferently from what it does in Britain. In general the 

 blight only aft'ects the leaves and stem, sometimes only the 

 leaves, the stem acquiring leaves a second time, the root 

 and tubers remaining comparatively sound ; but owing to 

 the early destruction or injury of the portion above ground, 

 the tubers only reaching about one-half their natural size. 

 This difference from the progress of the rot in Britain is 

 seen to be merely an affair of moisture. In travelling over 

 a considerable portion of the Continent I have found, that 

 wherever rain had fallen * at a certain stage of the pota- 

 to's growth, the blight had made rapid progress, while 

 those in the dry portion of the country remained un- 

 touched. But the rain not entering the very dry ground 

 more than an inch in most places, only the moistened por- 

 tion of the plant was aff'ected to rottenness, the tubers 

 remaining, as I have said, comparatively sound, though 

 only half the usual size, little or no increase taking place 

 after the destruction of the leaves. In regard to this seed 

 drying prevention in the dry climate of Eussia, where in 

 many places the rain-fall for the whole year is little more 

 than 12 inches, the dryness of the planted tuber may 

 induce a drier fii-mer texture of stem and leaves, which 

 may repel the blight; but it may not hold in the moist 

 climate of Britain, yet it is worth trial. In the dry coun- 

 tries I have noticed that plants of the same species have 

 quite a different look from those in the moister portions 

 of Britain and of Ireland. In the latter the plants seem 

 almost to be water spectres — solidified green water, similar 

 in some degree to the loaves of our artistic bakers, who are 

 said to be so expert, as with a slight powdering of flour to 

 solidify white water. 



Gourdic-hill, Errol, Carse of Patrick Matthew. 



Goivrie, Feb. 21, 



■* In the dry countries of the Continent, in Summer, rain is 

 generally caused or accompanied by thunder, and much de- 

 veloped electricity, wiiii sultry almosphere. The developed 

 electricity has a loosening power upon the vital attractions of 

 living organic matter, as well as upon dead organic matter ; and 

 supposing that the potato blight and otlier infectious' diseases are 

 vital — minutely animalcular, the developed electricity seems to 

 cook the substance of the larger organism — that it loosens the 

 vital attractions, sa as to render it more palatable and permeable 

 food to the animalcules of the disease; or in case of the disease 

 being merely chemical, disposes the organism to be chemically 

 afifeoted by the touch of the chemical disease. 



