XXli AN ADDRESS, &C, 



and its vicinity, from grown persons and children eating 

 bread and other dietetic preparations, composed wholly or 

 in part of rye; and as that excellent grain is known to be 

 very subject in the New England States, and in countries 

 of Europe, in which a climate similar to those States pre- 

 vail, to a morbid affection of the seeds, called ergot, causing 

 them to lengthen, and turn black, and to acquire deleterious 

 and singular properties; it is highly probable that the opi- 

 nion attributing the diseases mentioned, to the infected 

 seeds having been ground up with the perfect grains is well 

 founded. Indeed the circumstances attending the cases of 

 the subjects who were sickened, give very strong probabi- 

 lity to it; and as the same diseased state of the rye does 

 sometimes, though happily seldom occur in Pennsylvania, 

 I have thought it useful to mention it on the present occa- 

 sion, as a caution carefully to screen such grains from those 

 destined for Hour, and even to cause them carefullyto undergo 

 the process adopted in our improved mills for cleansing grain 

 before being ground. I think it also proper to add, that I 

 have reason to believe, that there is a great similarity to 

 ergot in the smut which often affects the wheat of Penn- 

 sylvania, and the middle States, and hence must suggest 

 the propriety of the same care being taken in scouring grain 

 produced from a field of wheat in which smut abounded, as 

 I recommended in the case of the rye; and in both cases 

 to prevent domestic animals, especially those with young, 

 from eating the chaff of such diseased rye or wheat, or even 

 inhaling the dust arising from the process of winnowing 

 them. 



Asa powerful means of promoting agriculture, I beg leave 

 to urge the enlightened husbandman of the United States to 

 omit no opportunity of committing to paper all such re- 

 marks as may offer to him in the course of his operations, 



