'of Avena satwa into Secale ceredle. 515 



there, to a few remarks that went to prove the utter want of 

 foundation of so heterodox an opinion. 



The most obvious manner in which the phenomenon can be 

 accounted for is, to suppose that the ground where the oats 

 had been sown contained a certain number of rye seeds, that 

 had been accidentally mixed with the oats, or left in the 

 ground after a previous crop of rye, or transported there with 

 the stable dung. Still, it appeared strange that, in all the ex- 

 periments, rye was the exclusive offspring from a crop of oats 

 treated in the above manner ; but I think the hypothesis that, in 

 consequence of a natural rotation of vegetation, a crop of oats, 

 treated in the peculiar manner I have indicated, might leave 

 the ground in such a state as to excite only the seeds of the rye 

 to vegetate, would be far from giving a satisfactory solution of 

 the problem. 



Within the last few years, there have been two experiments 

 of this sort made in a more than commonly careful manner. 

 One took place in Livonia. In the middle of a cabbage gar- 

 den, a bed of 12 ft. square was carefully dug and pulverised, 

 and sown, about the end of June, 1836, with picked oats. 

 The blade sprang not particularly well, and was thin, as the 

 seed had suffered from frost in the preceding autumn. Jt 

 was cut, for the first time, when part of it had already begun 

 to form a shoot. The second clipping took place in autumn. 

 In the present year, the second of the experiment, the bed is 

 seen covered with healthy rye stalks, though fewer in number 

 than the oat plants which stood on the bed last year. (Num* 

 bcrger Correspondent, No. 185., 1837.) 



M. Waitz of Schweighof, near Coburg, has published the fol- 

 lowing article in the same paper (No. 210., July 29. 1837.) : — 

 " M. de Schauroth, Lieut.-Colonel of Coburg, had communi- 

 cated to me already, five years ago, that the above experiment 

 had succeeded with him seven times, and that in every case there 

 had rye sprung from oats, which he had, during the first sea- 

 son, hindered from forming stalks. M. de Schauroth had been 

 averse from publishing his observation, lest it might give rise to 

 a literary controversy, which he was not inclined to follow out ; 

 but, as for his own person, he was fully satisfied about the truth 

 of the phenomenon, and asked me to repeat the same experi- 

 ment, to verify his own. However, I delayed the execution, in 

 order to have an opportunity of sowing oats on ground which 

 had neither yielded a crop of rye, nor had been manured with 

 straw-dung for a long time successively, that the experiment 

 might be the more conclusive. Three years ago, I ploughed a 

 paddock in which there had nothing been grown but grass for 

 the last fifteen or twenty years. It was planted with potatoes 



