On Mildew. 165 



stalks of wheat and other grain when struck by the 

 mildew. 



\^ou have seen many statements by American (and 

 I beheve British) agriculturists, of w^heat being reaped 

 while the grain w^as soft and milky, and the plants still 

 green, or greenish ; which nevertheless produced, if 

 not a full sized, yet a tolerably plump kernel, and yield- 

 ed a very fine and uncommonly white flour. It has been 

 as often said by the same agriculturists, that by such 

 early reaping of grain, on the first appearance of mildew j 

 you may obtain a valuable though not an abundant 

 crop ; the sap in the stalks continuing its natural 

 course to the heads : whereas if the same grain remain- 

 ed uncut, the seeds would be shrivelled, and often give 

 chaflT only instead of flour. — How is this to be account- 

 ed for ? The answer which has occurred to me, and 

 which I will now state, while it furnishes an explana- 

 tion of the declared fact, goes to confirm the theory of 

 my country man in the paper inclosed. It is this : 



The stalks of grain being severed from their roots, 

 the source of the malady is cut off*. The vessels of the 

 stalks are no longer distended by a superabundance of 

 sap ascending from the heated soil — they cease to re- 

 ceive any. The bursted vessels, through the wide 

 breaches in which, the sap, in its rapid ascent, was rush- 

 ing, naturally close ; and the sap already received into 

 the stalks (further aided perhaps by dews) pursues its 

 gentle course to the heads, and fills the grain. 



The writer's remark, that grain in old fields which 

 have been often dunged, is frequently mildewed, while 

 that on new land escapes (for which, on his h; pothesis, 

 he assigns a natural reason,) comes in support of your 



