130 YALE AGRICULTURAL LECTURES. 



from some cause, I hardly know what, did not produce a large 

 crop of corn. The wheat came up well, and tillered linely 

 during the autumn following. When winter set in, it stood 

 all over the piece ankle-deep, and quite thick. In the spring 

 following, and before the warm weather set in, it seemed to 

 retain all its freshness of color and vitality. It did not suffer 

 in the least from the winter cold, nor the spring frosts. It 

 was harvested in July, and by my record of crops I find it was 

 threshed August 7, 1851. It measured up, of clean wheat, 

 twenty-four bushels, and weighed sixty-five and a half pounds 

 per hushel. As already said, I have continued to raise winter 

 wheat ever since, and am perfectly satisfied that it is safer, by 

 far, and surer than summer wheat, for most soils in our State. 



" My method of culture has been briefly as follows : In the 

 first place, I have cultivated on ground which had been hoed, 

 and on the inverted sod, breaking at or about the time of sow 

 ing. Out of the time I think I have sowed four years on the 

 recently broken up land, and I do not see but that I have suc 

 ceeded in one case as well as in the other. I hardly need say 

 that the land in either case should be thoroughly plowed and 

 harrowed. I have invariably soaked my seed in a strong solu 

 tion of salt and water, and most of the time have used 4 Glau 

 ber's salts' with the common coarse salt not, however, soak 

 ing the seed more than two hours. After draining it, I have 

 generally rolled it in ashes, and then sowed immediately. If 

 my land has been cultivated and manured the spring before, I 

 use no other manure or stimulant at the time of sowing. If 

 not, as in the case of newly broken up land, I have used, and 

 am so well satisfied with the results that I shall continue to use, 

 from ten to fifteen bushels of ashes, with from one to two bush 

 els of salt, per acre, sown broadcast over the field at the time 

 of sowing the seed. The result has always been a larger crop 

 than under the most favorable seasons I could get from spring 

 wheat sown on the same kind of soil, and side by side." 



Col. Gate, as well as Mr. B., thinks that winter wheat can be 



