Book VI. GRASSES. 817 



grass garden, at Woburn. It is less productive than chiccory, bears mowing well, and 

 affords the same nutriment, in proportion to its bulk, as red clover. {Agricid. Chem, 

 p. 374.) 



5085. The yarrow {Achillea millefolium^ L. Jig. 579 b.), the common and alpine ladies* 

 mantle (Alchemilla vulgaris and aljmia, L.), and others have been tried among perennial 

 grasses, sown in parks, with a view to give flavor to milk, butter, mutton, and venison. 

 Sinclair considers yarrow as an essential ingredient of the most fattening and healthy 

 pastures. In all the pastures most celebrated for fattening or dairy produce, which he 

 examined in Devonshire, Lincolnshire, and in the vale of Aylesbury, yarrow was present 

 more or less in every part of the surface. [Hort. Gram. Wob. 2d edit. 412.) 



Chap. VI. 



Of the cultivaiqji^ Grasses. 



5086. The forage or hay and pasture grasses, of which we are now about to treat, are' 

 found clothing the surfice of the earth in every zone, attaining generally a greater 

 height, with less closeness at the root in the warm climates; and producing a low, close," 

 thick, dark green nutritive herbage, in the cooler latitudes. The best grass pastures, 

 those which are most productive and nutritive, are such as are found in countries that 

 have least cold in winter, and no excess of heat in summer. Ireland, Britain, and part of 

 Holland and Denmark, may equal or surpass any countries of the world in this respect; 

 but in every zone where, there are high mountains, there are certain positions between the 

 base and summit, where, from the equability of the temperature, turf may be found 

 equal to that in marine islands. It is a singular circumstance in regard to grasses, that 

 in the greater part of North America, the sorts that grow naturally on the plains are 

 almost all annuals, and consequently with the first frost they die, and the ground re- 

 mains naked till a fresh crop rises from the self-sown seeds next spring. Nearly the 

 same thing may be said of Poland and Russia, excepting on the banks of rivers and 

 en the mountains. 



5087. The universal presence of the forage grasses, and the rapidity with which all soils become covered 

 with them when left uncultivated, is the obvious reason why their systematic selection and culture is but 

 of recent date. Though the Romans cultivated clovers, and were careful of their meadows, it does not; 

 appear that the seeds of the proper grasses were collected and sown by them. None of the agricultural 

 writers, from Peter of Bologna to Parkinson in 1640, say a word about sowing grasses, though they all 

 mention clover and lucern. This branch of culture appears to have originated in England about the mid- 

 dle of the seventeenth century, and the grass made choice of was the rye-grass. The first mention made 

 of it for cultivation is in Dr. Plot's Oxfordshire, printed in 1677. " They have lately sown," says he, 

 " ray-grass, or the gramen loliaceum, by which they improve any cold, sour, clay-weeeping ground, for 

 which it is best, but good also for drier upland grounds, especially light stony or sandy land, which is unfit 

 for saintfoin. It was first sown in the chiltern parts of Oxfordshire, and since brought nearer Oxford by 

 one Eustace, an ingenious husbandman of Islip, who, though at first laughed at, has since been followed 

 even by those very persons that scorned his experiment." The first grass tried after rye-grass, appears 

 to have been the Phleum pratense by Rocque of Walham Green, about 1760. Soon after the seed of 

 cock's-foot grass was introduced from Virginia, under the name of orchard-grass, by the Society of Arts 

 {Ann. Reg. 176.5, 141.) ; fox.tail was tried at a later period, from the suggestions of Stillingfleet and Curtis. 



5088. Stillingfleet, about 1759, drew the attention of the reading agriculturist to the selection of dif- 

 ferent species of grasses; as did Dr. Anderson about the same time, and Swayne (Grmnlna Pasciia), and 

 Curtis {Observations on British Grasses), soon afterwards. The origin of this attention to grasses and' 

 native plants may be traced to the practice of forming local floras by botanists, and especially to the Flora> 

 Suecia of Linnaeus; and the British Floras oi Hudson, Withering, Lightfoot, Smith, Sec. in which the 

 medical and economical properties of the plants were mentioned ; and, in imitation of Linnsus, parti, 

 cular notice taken of the animals which fed upon them. 



5089. John Buke of Bedford made the latest and most laborious efforts towards attaining a knowledge 

 of the comparative value of all the British and some foreign grasses worth cultivating. The result is given 

 in an appendix to Sir H. Davy's Agricultural Chemistrj/, and more at large in Sinclair's Hortus Gramincui 



Woburnensis, 8vo. 2d edit. 1825, and as it is of considerable interest, we shall afterwards present an abstract. 



5090. With respect to the general culture of grasses, though no department of agriculture is more simple, 

 in the execution, yet, from the nature of grasses, considerable judgment is required in the design. Though 

 grasses abound in every soil and situation, yet, all the species do not abound in every soil and situation in- 

 differently. On the contrary, no class of perfect plants are so absolute and unalterable in their choice ia 

 this respect. The creeping-rooted and stoloniferous grasses will grow readily on most soils ; but tlie 

 fibrous-rooted species, and especially the more delicate upland grasses, require particular attention as to 

 the soil in which they are sown ; for in many soils they will either not come up at all, or die away in a few 

 years, and give way to the grasses which would naturally spring up in such a soil when left to a state of 

 nature. Hence in sowing down lands for permanent pasture, it is a good method to make choice of those 

 grasses which thrive best in adjoining and similarly-circumstanced pastures for a part of the seed ; and to- 

 mix with these what are considered the very best kinds. 



5091. New and excellent varieties of many of the grasses, especially, those used or fit to be used in the 

 <-onvertible husbandry, might no doubt be obtained by selection and cross breeding, and it is much to be- 

 wished that this were attempted by cultivators. The grasses to be here treated of may be classed as tall 

 sorts, or those best fitted for hay ; and dwarf grasses, or those fit only for pasturage : those experimented, 

 on at Woburn will next be noticed. 



ect. I.- Of the tall groiving or Hay Grasses. 

 5092. The My grrrses^ov the purposes of agriculture may be advantageously divided 

 into those of tempor.'.ry, and those of permanent duration. 



3 G 



