154 ESSAYS ON WHEAT 



reaped. The yield was mucli less than a single pound of 

 grain; and the first crop of the wheat that was destined 

 within a dozen years to overtax the mightiest elevators in 

 the land, was stored away in the winter of 1904-05 in 

 a paper packet no larger than an envelope. But just as 

 a few sparks are endowed with tremendous destructive 

 possibilities, so that, by starting a conflagration, they may 

 bring red ruin to an ancient city, reducing its treasures 

 to blackened heaps; so, in happy contrast therewith, the 

 little collection of grains in the Marquis packet embodied 

 vast constructive possibilities which, having been for- 

 tunately realized with the passage of time, have been a 

 potent factor in the uprearing of many a snug farmhouse 

 and many a stately civic building. In very deed, that 

 first handful of Marquis grains has brought naught but 

 increased prosperity in its wake and by its influence has 

 made farming on the brttad prairie-land a more attractive 

 industry. 



IV. The New Wheat is Named 



Dr. Saunders christened his new wheat Marquis for 

 the simple purpose of distinguishing it from other wheats 

 of which he already had many kinds in his laboratory; 

 and up to the present even the most extreme socialist has 

 never objected to this title. 



V. The Qualities of Marquis are Investigated 



Dr. Saunders then set to work to investigate the quali- 

 ties of Marquis. In the first place he observed that it be- 

 longed to the early group of wheats, i. e., that it ripened 

 its grains in summer earlier than most of the common 

 wheats of Canada. Earliness, of course, is a very im- 

 portant quality, for the sooner the grain ripens, the less 



