52 PLANT-BREEDING 



language and deal with the results of the work. Fortu- 

 nately, however, the Director and his staff have, from 

 time to time, given short surveys of the progress realized, 

 and of the methods followed in securing these practical 

 results. 



One of the means by which the young company contrived 

 to gain a notable influence over Swedish agriculture, was 

 by increasing the interest of the farmers in the purity and 

 the control of their seed grains. Exhibitions and distribu- 

 tions of samples of pure seeds, descriptions of the various 

 marks by which the varieties may be recognized, repeated 

 inspections of the fields of the station, where pure cultures 

 were grown side by side with the common Swedish sorts, 

 gradually convinced the farmers of the great significance 

 attached to the careful choice of their sowing-seeds. As 

 soon as this conviction became general, the results could no 

 longer remain doubtful, and, gradually, the fame of the 

 station increased to a degree corresponding with the aug- 

 mentation of the harvest. 



This purification of the imported strains must evidently 

 lead to an exact study of the constituents of the original mix- 

 tures and to a comparison of the part they take in the harvest. 

 In the beginning, however, these were wholly obscured by 

 the views which were then prevalent in Germany concerning 

 the improvement of races among agricultural plants. It 

 was taken for granted that the purification of the imported 

 samples was simply to make them true representatives of the 

 variety under the name of which they had been bought, 

 so as to guarantee their quality to the Swedish purchasers. 

 Furthermore, it was desired to acclimatize the best foreign 

 kinds and to make them suitable to the requirements of the 

 soils and climates of Sweden as well as to the various de- 

 mands of the local industries. This part of 'the program, 

 however, was intended as an application of the German 



