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grains were killed by the severe frost of tliat winter, but the 

 other plant remained perfectly healthy and vigorous to the 

 following harvest. That this was no mere accident, I proved by 

 planting the produce of this surviving plant the next Autumn, 

 the whole of the resultant plants proving as hardy as the parent. 

 I carried on this experiment for 12 years, always planting the 

 produce of each harvest in the following Autumn ; it was never 

 once affected even by the intense frosts of Christmas, 1863, and 

 February, 1864 — in fact, it proved a perfect "Winter" wheat, 

 although descended from a wheat which, until I received it, had 

 for nearly thirty years been planted annually, and never otherwise 

 than as a spring wheat. 



I have given this at some length because it seems to have 

 been always considered that, whatever difference of opinion 

 might exist as to other distinctions, this, at least, denoted two 

 distinct species. This is not difficult to understand, for had this 

 wheat been sown in the usual way in field culture, nine-tenths 

 would have perished, and thus have simply further demonstrated 

 that spring wheat cannot be sown successfully as a "Winter" 

 wheat, and is, therefore, entirely different. I have proved the 

 same as to barley. In fact, it is a mere habit of groAvth, just as 

 barley from Lapland, which there in two months from sowing 

 comes to harvest, if sown here, although it does not mature in 

 in two months, brings with it its habit and matures much 

 more rapidly than home grown barley. I am aware that I Avas 

 not the first to observe that the winter corn can become spring 

 corn, and vice versa, but it is indisputable that no one had before 

 observed that the two can be contained together in the same ear. 

 Not to weary you I Avill but briefly refer to some of the other 

 distinctions drawn. 



Here it is necessary to state shortly what I .shall further on 

 more fully explain — viz., that a single grain of a cereal, if planted 

 suitably, produces a plant consisting not of one, but of many ears. 

 I have found them upon the same plant fi-om a single grain, 



