Q6 FIELDS, FACTORIES AND WORKSHOPS. 



tion from year to year,, he had succeeded in producing 

 new prolific varieties of wheat and barley. Each grain 

 of these cereals, instead of giving only two to four ears, 

 as is the usual average in a corn-field, gave ten to twenty- 

 five ears, and the best ears, instead of carrying from sixty 

 to sixty-eight grains, had an average of nearly twice 

 that number of grains. 



In order to obtain such prolific varieties Major Hallett 

 naturally could not sow his picked grains broadcast ; he 

 planted them, each separately, in rows, at distances of 

 from ten to twelve inches from each other. In this way 

 he found that each grain, having full room for what is 

 called " tillering " (tallage in French *), would produce 

 ten, fifteen, twenty-five, and even up to ninety and 100 

 ears, as the case may be ; and as each ear would contain 

 from 60 to 1 20 grains, crops of 500 to 2500 grains, or 

 more, could be obtained from each separately planted 

 grain. He even exhibited at the Exeter meeting of the 

 British Association three plants of wheat, barley and 

 oats, each from a single grain, which had the following 

 number of stems ; wheat, ninety-four stems ; barley, 

 no stems; oats, eighty-seven stems.t The barley 

 plant which had no stems thus gave something like 

 5000 to 6000 grains from one single grain. A careful 

 drawing of that wonderful stubble was made by Major 

 Hallett's daughter and circulated with his pamphlets.* 



* " Shortly after the plant appears above ground it commences to 

 throw out new and distinct stems, upon the first appearance of which 

 a correspondent root-bud is developed for its support ; and while the new 

 stems grow out flat over the surface of the soil, their respective roots 

 assume a corresponding development beneath it. This process, called 

 ' tillering,' will continue until the season arrives for the stems to assume 

 an upright growth." The less the roots have been interfered with by over- 

 crowding the better will be the ears (Major Hallett, " Thin Seeding," etc.). 



f Paper on " Thin Seeding and the Selection of Seed," read before the 

 Midland Farmers' Club, 4th June, 1874. 



$" Pedigree Cereals," 1889. Paper on "Thin Seeding," etc., just 

 mentioned. Abstracts from The Times, etc., 1862. Major Hallett con- 

 tributed, moreover, several papers to the Journal of the Royal Agricul- 

 tural Society, and one to The Nineteenth Century. By the courtesy ol 

 the Co-operative Wholesale Society, I am enabled to reproduce that 

 drawing from a paper I contributed to the Society's Annual for 1897. 



