THE WHEAT CROP. 37 



carrying 122, and the other 152 perfect stems. Again, 

 at the International Exhibition of 1855, several similar 

 instances of the fecundity of the wheat plant were to be 

 seen. In the Museum of the Royal Agricultural College, 

 a barley plant may be seen, consisting of seventy-eight per- 

 fect stems, which yielded 1780 grains, the produce of a 

 single seed sown in the neighbourhood of Cirencester, in 

 the spring of 1847. These, of course, are all exceptional 

 cases ; still, they have their value as instances of the enor- 

 mous increase the reproductive powers of the cereal plants 

 are capable of when acting under favourable conditions. 



Although the individual farmer may never be able to 

 realize in general practice anything like these returns, 

 still he may rationally expect that the more he strives in 

 his practice to meet the requirements of the plant he culti- 

 vates, the more likely he is to secure successful results. 

 In agriculture especially, effects are readily seen say in 

 the shape of good or bad crops though, in the present de- 

 fective state of our knowledge, it is very difficult to assign 

 their exact causes. The best way to insure success is to 

 deserve it, and we can only deserve it when we have ful- 

 filled all the conditions which experience in principles, as 

 well as in practice, has pointed out to us. 



In the cultivation of wheat we have, first of all, the 

 soil to look to, to see that that is in a proper state, both 

 mechanically and chemically, for the growth of the plant 

 mechanically, that its particles are finely divided, and yet 

 sufficiently coherent to form a firm bed that they absorb 

 moisture, but admit of free percolation of superfluous wet 

 and that the tillage processes have been carried down 

 as deep as possible, so as to give the roots the maximum 

 amount of feeding surface. The Roman farmers were 

 accustomed to till their land 2 feet deep. 1 If we care- 



1 Non contentos esse nos oportet prima specie summi soli, sed diligenter 

 explorauda est inf erioris materise qualitas, terrena necne sit. Frumentis autem 

 sat erit si aeque bona suberit bipedanea humus. Columella, lib, ii. cap. 2. 



