RACES AND TYPES OF SOfiAK BEETS. 45 



already in existence. The sugar-beet specialists, hav- 

 ing this idea in view, commenced their work in France 

 and Germany as early as 183O. At Magdeburg, the 

 efforts were mainly centred on the varieties obtained 

 trom Erfurt and Ouedlinburg seed. The early papers 

 read by Vilmorin upon the subject were in 1850, 185 1 

 and 1856. 



While a beet grower is able, within his own 

 sphere, to produce a special type to which he gives his . 

 name, the variety always undergoes certain modifica- 

 tions by a change of conditions; while these variations 

 are not sufficient to materially affect the root after the 

 first year's planting, the deterioration if sure to follow, 

 unless the blood of the beet is kept constantly replen- 

 ished from its original source; roots showing the first 

 signs of change must be thrown out. In other words, 

 with all the success attained by selection, atavism* is a 

 force impossible to overcome. The variations which 

 occur with plants left to their own devices are neces- 

 sarily very different from those which are the outcome 

 of man's efforts; hence, the reason why the labors of a 

 conscientious seed grower are incessant and never- 

 ending. When the selection is properly looked after, 

 the reversion to lower forms seldom occurs; on the con- 

 trary, the characteristic of the type sought after 

 becomes more and more pronounced. Is it not just 

 that a specialist, who furnishes superior beet seed, from 

 beets of his own creation, should claim considerably 

 more money for his produce, than does an ordinary 

 seed grower who gives neither time nor money equiva- 

 lent for what he sells, and in the end becomes a 

 dealer in bastards, due to the fact that he has resorted 

 to variation in the methods of selection, as compared 

 with the specialist? 



•Showing the Influence of one beet upon another, the experiment 

 has been tried ot planting side by side, a superior white beet with an 

 ordinary red beet. Tlie beets from the seeds of wliite beet were appar- 

 ently of every possible variety, some of these being red, rose, etc., 

 and their sugar percentages varying from 7 to IT. 



