296 Literary and Philosophical Society. 



examine the crops of turnips, for which claims had been 

 made for the premiums of that society. He found the 

 crops of turnips very abundant and healthy, and that the 

 disease in potatoes had been greatly arrested by farmers 

 having turned them over in the pit, dried and sorted them ; 

 and his impression now is, that one-half of the crop of the 

 present year would, by these precautionary means, be saved. 



A very interesting letter was read from Mr. Rothwell, 

 the other inspector of the Agricultural Society, in which 

 he expresses his opinion, that one-third of the crop was 

 rendered worse by injudicious treatment before pitting ; 

 another third had been destroyed by the farmer having 

 pitted them too early and in too large quantities together ; 

 but that the remaining third may be considered saved by 

 those farmers who, following the recommendations of the 

 committee, have exerted themselves to get them properly 

 dried and stored. 



Mr. Just also informed the committee by letter, that 

 the potatoes he had washed and afterwards carefully dried, 

 remained perfectly sound, and that he had stopped the 

 progress of the disease in infected tubers by cutting them 

 in two and keeping them afterwards dry. 



Your committee have had much reason to be satisfied 

 with this result of their labours, and it will be gratifying to 

 remember that, acting upon the cautious experiments of 

 Mr. Binney, Mr. Just, Mr. Williamson, Mr. Thom, Mr. 

 Moore and others, it was from this committee the public 

 were first informed of the importance of getting stored 

 potatoes dry as soon as possible and keeping them so, by fre- 

 quent exposure to air and light, as the surest, as well as 

 the simplest, means of ridding them of the superabundant 

 moisture which was hastening their decay ; and also of 



