CHAPTER IV 



BREEDING NEW GRAINS 



^ I "^ HERE is something distinctly alarming 

 -•- in the thought of a period of world star- 

 vation slowly but surely and relentlessly ap- 

 proaching, when the earth will not be able to 

 support the race. Some who have noted the 

 steady wasting of the soils where cereals are 

 grown each succeeding year in a new country, 

 resulting in a gradual reduction in the yield of 

 these crops from the first year's yield upon the 

 virgin soil, have predicted this period, not so 

 very far distant, either,^ — a time when there 

 would not be enough bread to go around. 

 Some of these predictions have come from 

 high authorities. 



While enough has been developed in the 

 restoration of worn-out soils to show that such 

 a period as this must be so long postponed as 

 to remove it from the need of serious consider- 

 ation, still more has been demonstrated in the 

 creation of new wheats and corns to take the 



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