144 [Assembly 



mature the seed, the stems and branches ;\re hard, sapless, and of 

 little worth for anything like feed. This straw, as it is called, is use- 

 ful as litter for the barn-yard ; it aids in malcing up the compost 

 heaps, and here more by its bulk than any strong fertilizing power it 

 possesses. The grasses too, like the grain plant, when allowed to go 

 to seed, exhaust the land more by standing longer upon it ; they 

 draw from it some of its richest ingredients which the plants require 

 to ripen their seeds. The stubble of such grasses have no succulent 

 matter in them, and the after math, the young grass, or second crop, 

 will not grow up near as soon nor as rich. How can they? they 

 cannot spring from the remains of the old stems if they are in the 

 habit of doing it when green, the stems are dry and dead, the roots or 

 some o[ them are often dead too ; these take time for revival. When 

 the young blades do spring up from either or any source, they cannot 

 come up as thick or grow as vigorously, so much of their nourishment 

 has been consumed in maturing the parent plants. The reason given 

 by some that grass if cut late when the seed is hard, is drier, it may 

 be cured better and with less labor for hay. This reason has very 

 little weight when we consider the quantity of fine weather we usually 

 have about the time of hay-making, greater, much, than many Euro- 

 pean countries, and especially Great Britain. A few hours sooner or 

 later in curing cannot be of much moment, and neither this nor any 

 other reason given for late cutting it, is thought ought to have the 

 least weight when compared with the great sacrifice of nutriment and 

 other injuries stated, must necessarily flow from the practice. Timo- 

 thy has been excepted from the general rule of cutting in the flower, 

 but by no means to wait till the seed is hard ; the best time it is 

 thought for cutting is immediatety or soon after the flower has fallen. 

 Timothy, in habits and character, resembles more the grain plant ; its 

 stem is thicker and stronger, it grows higher where the soil is rich than 

 most of the grasses : it has more silica or sand in its coating, and is 

 longer in attaining its full size. Hence the juices are longer in 

 reaching all its parts from the root to the culraen, and condensing a 

 little so as to acquire their richest consistence. It is thought that 

 even this plant would suffer less and the injury generally be less if cut 

 .n the flower than to let it stand until after the seed is ripe. Timothy 

 too, when cut late, has given rise to the impression made on some that 

 it is a hard, coarse, dry grass; the late cutting.is generally the reason 



