SOME GENERAL PRINCIPLES 47 



seed. 3. There should be an abundance of leaves. 

 Such production will affect favorably palatability in 

 the pasture and also in the hay. 4. The blossoms 

 should be so short that the honey which they contain 

 may be accessible to the ordinary honey bee. The 

 importance of this characteristic cannot be easily 

 overestimated. It would not only tend to a great in- 

 crease in seed production through the favorable in- 

 fluence which it would have on fertilization, but it 

 would greatly increase the honey harvest that would 

 be gathered every year, and 5. They should be pos- 

 sessed of much vigor and hardihood; that is, they 

 should haA'e much power to grow under adverse 

 conditions, as of drought and cold. The person who 

 will furnish a variety of red clover possessed of these 

 characteristics will confer a boon on American agri- 

 culture. 



Bacteria and Clovers. — The fact has long been 

 known, even as long ago as the days of Pliny, and 

 probably much before those da)^s, that clover, when 

 grown in the rotation, had the power to bring fertil- 

 ity to the soil. This fact was generally recognized 

 in modern agriculture and to the extent, in some 

 instances, of giving it a place even in the short ro- 

 tations. But until recent decades, it was only par- 

 tially known how clover accomplished such fertiliza- 

 tion. It AA-as thought it thus gathered fertility by 

 feeding deeply in the subsoil, and through the plant 

 food thus gathered, the root system of the plants 

 were so strengthened in the cultivated surface sec- 

 tion of soil as to account for the increased produc- 

 tion in the plants that followed clover. According 



