XVUl PREFACE. 



nutritive': it is therefore most profitable for the alternate hus- 

 bandry, or permanent pasture, where culms are less necessary. 

 Under these different relations, therefore, a grass should be con- 

 sidered, before it be absolutely rejected, or indiscriminately re- 

 commended. But allowing that the different grasses were easily 

 distinguished from each other with certainty, and that Farmers 

 were in possession of the respective seeds, yet the length of time 

 it would require to prove the relative value of any considerable 

 number of them, by the usual mode of making experiments for 

 this purpose, with the heavy expense attending on failures, would 

 discourage almost any individual from an undertaking which, 

 however beneficial the results might ultimately prove to the com- 

 munity at large, would be attended with a great and certain 

 expense for an uncertain return. 



The works of Linnaeus, Smith, Stillingfleet, Hudson, Curtis, 

 Martyn, and many others, have been productive of much good, 

 in calling the attention of Agriculturists to a more particular ex- 

 amination of the comparative merits of the different grasses, and 

 in affording the means of distinguishing the different species and 

 varieties with more certainty. 



The valuable labours of the Agricultural Societies of Great 

 Britain, of the Board of Agriculture of Stuttgart, and the pa- 

 triotic exertions of eminent individuals in the same cause, have 

 raised a spirit of inquiry, which cannot fail to produce the most 

 beneficial effects in this important branch of practical Agricul- 

 ture. A hope of promoting these views v/as the motive that 

 induced the Duke of Bedford to institute the following series 

 of experiments. But before entering into the details, the author 

 may be permitted to say a few words respecting the additions 

 which have been made to the work since the first edition in folio 

 was printed. 



In the original copy of this work, the catalogue of proper 

 grasses contained upwards of three hundred and twenty species 

 of grasses ; but in this edition the number of distinct species of 

 the proper grasses enumerated, amounts to about one thousand 



