66 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



roundings.* A species, like a carefully laden sliip, represents a 

 balancing of forces within and without. Disturbance may come 

 through variation from within, as from a shifting of the cargo, or 

 in some cases from without. We may suppose both forces to be 

 active in producing variation, a change in the internal condition 

 rendering the plant more susceptible to any change in its surround- 

 ings. Under the influence of any marked disturbance, a state of 

 unstable equilibrium may be brought about, at which times the 

 species as such is easily acted upon by very slight agencies. 



One of the most marked of these derangements is a consequent 

 of cross-breeding within the extreme limits of varieties. The re- 

 sultant forms in such cases can persist only by close breeding or 

 by propagation from buds or the equivalents of buds. Disturb- 

 ances like these arise unexpectedly in the ordinary course of 

 nature, giving us sports of various kinds. These critical periods, 

 however, are not unwelcome, since skillful cultivators can take 

 advantage of them. In this very field much has been accom- 

 plished. An attentive study of the sagacious work done by 

 Thomas Andrew Knight shows to what extent this can be done.f 

 But we must confess that it would be absolutely impossible to 

 predict with certainty how long or how short would be the time 

 before new cereals or acceptable equivalents for them would be 

 provided. Upheld by the confidence which I have in the intelli- 

 gence, ingenuity, and energy of our experiment stations, I may 

 say that the time would not probably exceed that of two genera- 

 tions of our race, or half a century. 



In now laying aside our hypothetical illustration, I venture to 

 ask why it is that our experiment stations, and other institutions 

 dealing with plants and their improvement, do not undertake 

 investigations like those which I have sketched ? Why are not 

 some of the grasses other than our present cereals studied with 

 reference to their adoption as food-grains ? One of these species 

 will naturally suggest itself to you all, namely, the wild rice of 

 the lakes, t Observations have shown that, were it not for the 



* Gray's Botanical Text-Book, vols, i and ii. 



f A Selection from the Physiological and Horticultural Papers published in the 

 Transactions of the Royal and Horticultural Societies, by the late Thomas Andrew Knight, 

 Esq., President of the Horticultural Society, London. London, 1841. 



X Hlustrations of the Manners and Customs and Condition of the North American 

 Indians. By George Catlin. London, ISTe. A reprint of the account published in 1841, 

 of travels in 1832-'40. " Plate 278 is a party of Sioux, in bark canoes (purchased of the 

 Chippewas), gathering the wild rice, which grows in immense fields around the shores of 

 the rivers and lakes of these northern regions, and used by the Indians as an article of 

 food. The mode of gathering it is curious and, as seen in the drawing, one woman 

 paddles the canoe, while another with a stick in each hand bends the rice over the canoe 

 with one and strikes it with the other, which shakes it into the canoe, which is constantly 

 moving along until it is filled." Vol. ii, p. 208. 



