36 



It may be here the place to disperse a wrong conception held 

 by certain seedsmen with insufficient knowledge of the case, or 

 misguided by others who may know a good deal more of grass- 

 seeds, but who seem, notwithstanding, to have acquired a wrong 

 conception of it, and who, no doubt quite involuntarily taking their 

 opinion for a truth, base their reasoning thereon, piling up argu- 

 ments against what is according to their views a bad thing to be 

 wiped out, and who make others think like they do. We mean 

 the so-called adulteration of grass-seeds. 



It is far from us to pretend, that there is no room for adulter- 

 ation of seeds to the advantage of the seedsman, desirous to 

 derive unrighteous profits from his trade. But where the seed- 

 trade in general is a trade of confidence in the first place, it is 

 his own interests which will guide every sensible seedsman who 

 has at heart his concern and means to maintain the position he 

 takes up in the trade, not to do willfully anything that may be 

 detrimental to his repute and to the confidence placed in him by 

 his customers. 



This said, it is not difficult to us to make clear to the reader, 

 that in most of the cases where, at first sight, one might feel 

 inclined to think of adulteration, we have simply to do with the 

 result of natural causes, at least in such cases where collected 

 seeds are the object of the denunciation. 



If the reader remembers what we said before of the hasty 

 manner in which the majority of the collectors bring their seeds 

 together, to get in a minimum of time the maximum of weight; 

 if he knows, furthermore, that various kinds of plants of the same 

 height are standing next to one another, and if he finally knows, 

 that the difFerence in time they come to maturity is for a few 

 varieties that of a few days only, he will readily understand, that 

 collected seeds of such varieties are bound to turn out, when 

 thrashed and cleaned, as more or less mixed lots, according to the 

 greater or lesser care and time a collector has bestowed on bringing 

 together his pioduce. 



Such will be even more clear to the reader when we tell him, 

 that In the case of Dact\lis glomerata (Orchard-grass) 

 and Festuca pratensis {Meadow Fescue), the maturity of 

 which falls but a few days later (in certain years of excessive heat 

 and drought even simultaneously for both kinds), it is a system 

 in certain of the growing-districts to cut these two varieties together, 

 and as the weight op the Orchard-seed is far lighter and the plants 



