CULTIVATION OF PLANTS. U9 



as cultivated Canary grass, floating meadow grass, hairy cocks- 

 foot or finger grass. The Canary grass is an annual; a native 

 of the Canary Islands, but now naturalized in several parts of 

 Europe and South America; and it is raised, but in a limited 

 degree, in the southern states. It flowers from June to Au- 

 gust, and ripens its seeds from September to October. 



It requires a loamy soil, in good heart, well pulverized; the 

 seeds are sown in rows, at about a foot apart, as early in the 

 spring as the state of the weather will justify; quantity of seed, 

 from four to five gallons per acre. The after culture consists in 

 keeping the soil well stirred and perfectly free from weeds. 

 The common produce is from thirty to thirty-four bushels per 

 acre; but under the best management it has often yielded fifty 

 bushels to the acre. The use of the seed is chiefly as food for 

 Canary and other cage and aviary birds. But it is of little 

 economical importance. 



Floating meadow grass is a plant tolerably productive of 

 seeds, which are sweet and nourishing. They are collected in 

 some parts of Germany, Poland, and other sections of Europe, 

 whence they are brought to England and this country, and sold 

 in the shops under the name of viunnn. The plant is too 

 aquatic in its habits to admit of extended cultivation. 



Hairy cocksfoot or finger grass is an annual plant; it is 

 grown in sandy cultivated fields. In Poland and Lithuania 

 it abounds by the road sides; and its seeds being collected and 

 boiled with milk, in the manner of rice, are said to be esteem- 

 ed. Many other grasses could be here enumerated as yield- 

 ing seeds of sufficient size to be used as food; but none of them 

 can be regarded as fitting subjects of cultivation for their seeds. 



9. BROOM CORN-S UGAR SORGUM. 



THE cultivation of broom corn is carried on to a very con- 

 siderable extent in many of the rich intervals of New Eng- 

 land; and no crop perhaps, pays generally better on the 

 whole. Some towns on the Connecticut are almost exclusively 

 devoted to its culture and the manufacture of its panicles into 

 brooms, wisks, &c., a very simple process. It is somewhat 

 singular, that its cultivation has been confined, until within a 

 few years, almost exclusively to New England; and it is not 

 less remarkable, that notwithstanding its importance, in no 

 book on agriculture can any account of the history or the cul- 

 tivation of this plant be found. It is not even mentioned, we 

 believe, in the valuable agricultural books published in New 



