Curt.—On Grasses and Fodder Plants. 883 
grasses than at present ; they were annuals, or biennials, but from these, 
Stickney, Pacey, Lawson, and others, by cultivation and management, have 
produced kinds that they call perennial, and that certainly live on for several 
years in permanent pastures. The Italians, by carefully saving and sowing 
the seed under the best conditions, have now established a variety, the seed 
of which is sold at a high price, and when sown in irrigated meadows, 
. Or on sewage farms, gives a yield that is enormous, and so great has 
been the benefit to British and other farmers, by the improvements 
made in these two grasses, that without them they could not have 
produced the same quantity of meat, and could not have obtained a 
return from their farms and- pastures. In America the agriculturists 
have cultivated and sown some of their indigenous grasses with the 
greatest profit and benefit to themselves,—the blue grass (Poa compressa) in 
Kentucky; the red-top (Agrostis rubra) in the Western States; and the 
Phleum pratense (timothy, cat-tail, etc.), in the Northern States,—and these 
have been the principal kinds cultivated, although they had such numerous 
and excellent grasses to choose from. 
In the Australian colonies the indigenous grasses, although most excel- 
lent ones are found, are gradually being killed out by injudicious burning 
and over-feeding of stock not allowing them to seed or reproduce them- 
selves by a fair rest, and by other bad management will get less abundant 
each year, and the grasses now being sown will not beneficially supersede 
them. A few years since, the Hierochloe redolens was one of the best winter 
fattening grasses in these districts, and the cattle, sheep, and horses, eagerly 
sought it out, and fed upon it; now it is rapidly disappearing, and what is 
left the live stock will soon kill out, as each year it becomes more scarce, 
and so with many other species here, while in Australia we learn from the 
writings of Mr. Bacchus, Mr. Bailey, and others, that the kangaroo grass 
( Anthistiria australis) which used to appear like fields of corn, so vigorous 
and abundant was it, has now become stunted and is dying out in many 
parts, and other species also as well as the kangaroo grass; useless or even 
noxious weeds are taking the places vacated by the nutritious grasses, yet 
to prevent such disastrous consequences following the reckless destruction 
of the indigenous grasses, either these grasses should have been fairly 
treated, or other suitable ones should have been substituted ; and there are 
numbers which could be with advantage sown as can be easily proved. For 
whenever we understand the full history and description of a grass growing 
in any place, or where we can grow and test a grass under experimental 
culture, it is not difficult to predict and deseribe its worth. When friends 
of mine in California desired my advice and assistance to find a grass that 
would bear the climatic conditions of the hot, dry climate of California, I 
