70 GRASSES. 



[CLASS III. ORDER II. 



paid to the cultivation of all the cereal gramineae ; while to that para- 

 mount object, there has been added, in this country especially, an al- 

 most equal share of consideration in the production, situation, and im- 

 provement of the various grasses suited for pasturage and hay. The 

 success which has attended this course, identified as it has been with 

 scientific as well as practical skill, and also pursued under the most 

 favourable circumstances of soil and climate, has placed Great Britain 

 in the very highest position among the countries engaged in agricul- 

 tural experiments. 



From the foregoing facts and considerations alone, the value of a 

 botanical acquaintance with this very hnpoitant tribe of vegetables to 

 the agriculturist, in the successful cultivation of his land, will be ob- 

 vious. 



The Cereal, or corn-grasses, though the least numerous division of 

 this vast tribe, are nevertheless, as already intimated, of the greatest 

 importance, as from them the great mass of mankind directly 

 receive the principal articles of their sustenance. The chief of these 

 grasses, or those which are most familiarly known, and cultivated to 

 the greatest extent from 'the value of their farinaceous seeds, are 

 Wheat, Triticum ; Rice, Oryza ; Maize, Zea ; ~R\e, Secale ; Barley, 

 Hordeum; the Oat, Arena ; and Millet, Sorghum. These, which are 

 the principal grasses commonly cultivated in this and other countries 

 for ihe value of their grain, are indebted for the preference which they 

 have obtained in the estimation of mankind, to the large size of the 

 seeds, and abundance of foeculent matter which they contain ; not that 

 even the seeds of the pastoral grasses are less wholesome, wiih the ex- 

 ception of Lolium temulcntwn, but on account of their much smaller 

 size, and the little foeculent matter which they contain, they are of 

 comparative little or no value as corn-grasses. 



For an account of the distribution of the Cercalia, the following is an 

 extract from an interesting paper on the Geographical Distribution of 

 Grasses, by Schouw, from Professor Jameson's Edinburgh Philosophi- 

 cal Journal, for 1825 : "A detailed representation of the distribution 

 of the cultivated Gramineae would certainly be very interesting. Here 

 we must restrict ourselves to a short and general outline. We shall 

 endeavour to specify those Graminecc which are the prevailing ones in 

 the larger zones and continents, mentioning in passing those plants 

 of other families which either supply the place of, or are associated 

 with, the different kinds of grain, as the chief articles of food. This 

 distribution is determined, not merely by climate, but depends on the 

 civilisation, industry; and traffic of the people, and often on historical 

 events. 



" Within the northern polar circle, agriculture is found only in a 

 few places. In Siberia grain reaches at the utmost only to 60", in the 

 eastern parts scarcely above 55*, and in Kamtschatka there is no agri- 

 culture even in the most southern parts (51). The polar limit of agri- 



