NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY OF GLASGOW. 271 



and below ground. The drills, however, were too narrow, as the 

 underground shoots came through the sides into the furrows between. 

 The summer proved very unfavourable to the potato crop; and in 

 the month of July I was disappointed to see, even on the leaves of 

 the Chilians, the peculiar flocculence of the Peronospora infestans. 

 As to the yield of these ten stones, it is very small, being about 

 two and a half bags of fairly good potatoes, and half a bag of dis- 

 eased ones. 



A stone of the seed was sent to Mr. Robertson, Dublin, a gen- 

 tleman who has taken much interest in the cultivation of the 

 potato ; and now, at the end of the season, he writes : — " The 

 Chilian potatoes have turned out an entire failure, and they have 

 done the same with a neighbour of mine." 



Mr. William Lindsay, Farmer, Craigends, Fenwick, planted a 

 stone on peaty ground that had not been cropped within the memory 

 of man. They sent up strong, rank stems, with great broad leaves ; 

 but, when the shaws were at their best, a storm of wind came on 

 which broke them down. Mr. Lindsay writes that, leaving out the 

 tubers too small to plant next year, the crop is about equal to the 

 seed. 



I also sent some to my brother, Mr. Robert King, Wolverton, 

 Buckinghamshire, and he gave them to friends. He writes that 

 the weight of the crop is about twice that of the seed ; and that 

 the potatoes are small, have rather deep eyes, are of a pretty, clear, 

 pinkish red colour, and are quite free from disease. He adds : — 

 " All say they have not had a fair chance, as they were planted too 

 late, and being late had not well-selected ground." 



Mr. John Barbour, Farmer, Risk, Lochwinnoch, planted whole 

 about a stone and a half on good soil of a somewhat peaty nature. 

 The crows took away some of the seed, but the yield is about 

 seven stones. The tubers are very pretty, but soft and small, the 

 largest being about seven inches in circumference. In an unpicked 

 sample of a hundred I counted only seven diseased ones. Other 

 small quantities planted around Glasgow have given similar results. 



As a consequence of these experiments, I feel less certain than I 

 did a year ago either as to the cause or the cure of the potato disease; 

 but I am now satisfied that we cannot expect to get rid of it by the 

 simple expedient of importing sound seed. We must not, however, 

 consider the trials as finished till next autumn, at the earliest; for, 

 as we have seen, the seed was planted six weeks too late and dug 



