PLANTS AND THEIR CULTURE. 91 



cartload, while stowing away for keeping, two or 

 three quarts of sea-salt : the other, to interpose be- 

 tween two layers of clover one of clean straw. By 

 the first method, the whole mass is made accept- 

 able to cattle ; by the second, the quantum of nu- 

 tritive forage is increased ; and by both methods the 

 clover is effectually prevented from heating* 



The next step in our system is to plough in the 

 clover stubble as a preparation for the succeeding 

 crop. 



VI. Of Wheat. 



This grain, so useful to man, because forming so 

 large a portion of his subsistence, is happily found 

 to adapt itself to a great variety of soils and cli- 

 mates. It grows vigorously in clay, in loam, in 

 calcareous earth, and even in sand, when aided by 

 manures, or in succession to pease, vetches, clo- 

 ver, &c. To the north it is found in the frozen 

 regions of Siberia ; and in the south, under the 

 burning sun of Africa, it yields, according to the 

 declaration of Pliny, more than one hundred fold.f 

 In ancient Rome, its use, as a food for man, soon 

 superseded that of barley and rye ; and in modern 

 Europe it is denominated corn, by way of eminence. 



Of this invaluable grain there are four species, 

 -distinctly marked and generally acknowledged, viz., 

 many-headed wheat,{ Polish wheat, spelts, and 



* The more modern, and, we think, far better way of making 

 clover hay, is to put it into small cocks as soon as it has become 

 dried or wilted in the swaths ; and to leave it so for thirty or 

 forty hours, when it will be found sufficiently dried, on being 

 opened and spread to the sun an hour or two, to take to the barn 

 or stack. In this way it makes the most and best fodder, and is 

 cured with the least labour. J. B. 



f " Tritico nihil est fertilius : utpote cum e modio, si sit ap- 

 tum solum, quale in Byzacio Africae campo, centum quinquageni 

 modii redden tur." XVIII. L. Nat. Hist. Pliny. Nothing is 

 more productive than wheat ; for a bushel of this grain, sown on 

 a soil adapted to it, as that of the plain of Byzantium, in Africa, 

 will yield a hundred and fifty fold. 



$ This is the Triticum Compositum of botaniwa, called wheat 



