i82 Right Hon. Sir Joseph Banks, BarL on the 



man who, by his skill and talents in agriculture alone, has raised himself to opu- 

 lence, and possesses a considerable landed estate, for which he is certainly in part 

 indebted to the free culture oF spring wheat during the last thirty years. 



Mr. Sers sows spring wheat from .the 25\h of March till the first week in May ; 

 for a full crop he sows 14 pecks on an acre, and expects to reap four quarters ; if 

 he sows seeds under it, which is very generally practised, he sows nine pecks, and 

 expects three quarters in return ; he finds it thrive nearly equally well on his stifF 

 and his light land; and has found it, by experience, to be exempt from the mildew 

 or blight, and free from all damage of the grub or wire worm. 



The farmers in South Holland, where Mr. Sers resides, uniformly declare that 

 they have been many years ago compelled, by frequent attacks of the mildew or 

 blight, to abandon almost entirely the sowing of winter wheat, and that they then 

 substituted spring wheat in its place, and have used it ever since : they believe it 

 to be wholly exempt from the mildew or blight. In the neighbourhood of Horn- 

 castle, where I live, the land is either light or sandy, or composed chiefly of Nor- 

 folk marie, called in that neighbourhood white clay. Such land, though tolerably 

 productive in barley and seeds, is not to be compared with the rich and fertile 

 tracts of South Holland ; and yet the culture of spring wheats has of late years in- 

 creased, and is now increasing fast, because the millers begin to understand its na- 

 ture, and cease to undervalue it as they did at first. 



The grain of spring wheat is considerably smaller than that of winter wheat; in 

 colour it resembles red lammas so much, that it may be mixed with that grain, and 

 this mixture will do no injury to the seller, as spring wheat weighs heavy; nor to 

 the buyer, as it yields better at the mill than from its appearance might be expected ; 

 60 lb. a bushel is about its usual weight. Mr. Sers's, of this year, weighed 6t lbs. 

 and he has sold some mixed with less than half of red lammas, at the usual market 

 price of the winter wheat of the last harvest, though the winter wheat is better in 

 quality this year, and the spring worse than usual. 



In the countries best acquainted with its culture, spring wheat is preferred to all 

 other corn for raising a crop of seeds. This is owing to the small quantity of leaf 

 it bears, less perhaps than any other corn, and to the short duration of the leaf, 

 which fades and falls down almost as soon as it has attained its full size. 



In cases where red wheat has been damaged by the wire worm, a mischief which 

 seems of late years to have increased in this island, spring wheat appears to hold 

 out an easy and a simple remedy. In the first week of May the ravages of the 



