834 APPENDIX. 
frances, which would be a yield, per hectare, that no other agricultural 
product can equal. 
The culture of the sugar sorgho needs, as for all annual plants of 
considerable growth, a soil rich and considerably improved. In Pro- 
vence and Algeria, the sorgho could not ripen its seed and pass through 
all the stages of its growth without the assistance of irrigation. 
However, in the rainy seasons, we can hope for its complete maturity ; 
for in 1853 several of our colleagues of the Assembly have obtained 
magnificent sorghos, and harvestéd good grains on a soil quite dry, 
and where irrigation was not practicable. Wheat soils, and alluvial 
ones, would suit it especially. We have seen it attain rich growth on 
a stony and light soil. 
We have already mentioned that the sorgho attains a height of 
three or four yards. Each plant produces four to six stalks, of which 
each one is gurmounted by a panicle weighing two hundred to three 
hundred grammes, and of which each one may yield two hundred to 
three hundred grains. The panicle of the main stalk is the first to 
arrive at maturity ; the secondary panicles ripen at about the same 
time, and even the subsequent ones ripea their seed when the autumn 
is not too severe. 
About the end of September, the panicles begin to ripen ; and it is 
at the transition from the milk state, that the saccharine richness of 
the plant is carried to its highest degree, 
This fact, so interesting as regards the reproduction of the plant 
and the yield of grain, has been proved by our honorable President, 
M. de Beauregard. 
M. Vilmorin has moreover observed, that the saccharine matter in 
the stalk decreases gradually, from the base to the top ; andit is in 
the spaces between the lower joints that it is the most marked. 
The plant is essentially rich in hydro-carbon products (sugar, alco- 
hol) ; it is therefore improbable that nitrogenized manures will be as 
indispensable to its growth, as to plants abounding in gluten (wheat, 
barley, oats) ; in this view of the case, the crop would not be an 
exhausting one. 
It is not without design that we introduce into the consideration of 
an industrial plant, its value as a fodder crop. ‘The rearing of cattle, 
