Selection of Elementary Species 107 



peared. Among tlie vanished forms are tlie 

 special barley and wheat of the lake-dwellings, 

 the remains of which have been accidentally 

 preserved, but most of the forms have disap- 

 peared without leaving any trace. 



This inference is supported by the researches 

 of Solms-Laubach, who found that in Abyssinia 

 numerous primitive types of cereals are still in 

 culture. They are not adequate to compete 

 with our present varieties, and would no doubt 

 also have disappeared, had they not been pre- 

 served by such quite accidental and almost 

 primitive isolation. 



Closing this somewhat long digression into 

 history we will now resume our discussion con- 

 cerning the origin of the method of selecting 

 cereals for isolation and segregate-cultivation. 

 Some decades after Le Couteur, this method 

 was taken up by the celebrated breeder Patrick 

 Sheriff, of Haddington, in Scotland. His be- 

 lief, which was general at that time, was *' That 

 cultivation has not been found to change well 

 defined kinds, and that improvement can be best 

 attained by selecting new and superior varie- 

 ties, which nature occasionally produces, as if 

 inviting the husbandman to stretch forth his 

 hand and cultivate them." 



Before going into the details of Sheriff's 

 work it is as well to say something concerning 



