138 THE WHEAT CULTURIST. 



is less abundant than the honey which the bees may 

 gather from the opening flowers, teaches the cultivator 

 of the soil the transcendent importance of fertilizing, 

 pulverizing, and teasing the land by all the mechanical 

 means in his power to bring it into that peculiar state of 

 productiveness, which will supply the greatest amount 

 of available material for the formation of wheat milk. 



Domestic goats that roam about the streets of our 

 populous cities, are ever ready to devour every sort of 

 garbage, even to brown wrapping-paper ; and their di- 

 gestive organs are so powerful that milk is formed by 

 these animals out of the roughest and poorest qualities 

 of food. But the functions of the growing wheat plant 

 are so delicate, that other plants which are stronger and 

 more hardy than the wheat plant, must prepare pabulum 

 for the roots of this plant to feed upon. For this pur- 

 pose there is no other plant like clover for transforming 

 the rough material in the soil into available plant-food, 

 such as the organs of the wheat plant will appropriate 

 to the production of "wheat milk." The hardy roots 

 of clover will decompose and digest, so to speak, only 

 a very small quantity of earthy matter which will form a 

 wheaten milk, after the ground has been ploughed, and 

 the clover roots have decayed. Yet, if the fine pabu- 

 lum is in the soil, and if the land be prepared properly 

 by thorough pulverization, the roots of the wheat plants 

 will find the little atoms which are adapted to the pe- 

 culiar requirements of those organs that produce the 

 seeds. 



The great practical point, therefore, for wheat-grow- 

 ers to consider is, fattening the soil with alumina, phos- 

 phorus, silica, and other fertilizing substances, which 

 will afford an abundant supply of the right kind of pab- 



