234 On the Culture of fVheat within the Tropics. 



" First, from the mountains of St. Anne's, where the seed had been 

 sown the latter end of January, and the corn was ripe the latter end of 

 April. In another part of the same district, the dates of sowing differed 

 from the above, but the wheat ripened in nearly the same period. 



" Next from the mountains of St, Andrew's. On one property. Fair 

 Hill, (about 2,000 feet above the sea) the sowing and the ripening hap- 

 pened at the same dates as in the first mentioned case. Of this corn, one 

 grain produced ticenty-eight ears, containing altogether fifteen hundred 

 grains, (being an average of fifty-three grains for each ear). Notwith- 

 standing this apparent success, the proprietor of the place thinks it un- 

 likely that planters would grow the Victoria Wheat in preference to the 

 ' Great Corn,' as it is called here, i. e. Zea Mayz. On another plantation 

 again, Charlottenberg, (about 4,000 feet above the level of the sea,) the 

 seed was sown early in March, and received a top dressing : in the course 

 of a few days it had already sprung up three inches above ground ; and, 

 as favourable moderate rains continued to fall subsequently, the corn 

 throve well, and ripened in the early part of June, producing abundantly 

 grain of a larger size than the parent seed ; the ears being large and full. 

 Six of these, for instance, yielded three hundred and thirty-six grains, 

 weighing three ounces, making an average of fifty -six grains, weighing 

 half an ounce, to each ear. Mr. W. B. King, an assistant Judge of Assize, 

 and Member of Assembly, has since sent me two bundles of the ears of 

 his wheat, and I intend to enclose one or two of them as a specimen of the 

 produce of the Victoria wheat here. From the trial, just made, Mr. King 

 has no doubt that this grain could be cultivated in many parts of this island, 

 and that it might become a profitable resource." 



Such is the result of the experiments made under the immediate auspices 

 of this enlightened and benevolent individual, and the most sanguine ex- 

 pectation could hardly have anticipated any thing more conclusive or more 

 satisfactory. 



The wheat which was the subject of these experiments, was of that kind 

 cultivated in the environs of La Victoria and San Matheo, spoken of by 

 Humboldt, in the fourth volume of his Personal Narrative, as being sown 

 there in the month of December, and the harvest reaped on the seventieth 

 or seventy-fifth day, an interval corresponding with singular accuracy with 

 the account given above by Dr. Bancroft. Of this wheat Humboldt says, 

 that its grain is large, white, and abounding in gluten ; having a thinner 

 and softer pellicle than that of the wheat raised on the cold table lands of 

 Mexico. He states the produce of an acre {arpent des eaux et fordts, or 

 legal acre of France, of which 1.95 make an hectare, being equal to about 

 one acre and a quarter English,) as amounting usually from three thousand 

 to three thousand two hundred pounds weight, being at the rate, for an 

 English acre, of from two thousand one hundred and sixty to two thousand 

 five hundred and sixty pounds j the growth of what we may conclude to be 



