THE NATURAL HISTORY OF BRITISH GRASSES. 69 
The experiments about to be detailed were performed 
with the Avena fatua. In the autumn of 1851 we collected 
some seed of the wild oat, putting it aside for spring plant- 
ing, and in the spring of 1852 drilled a plot of 23 yards 
square with the seed that had been kept during the winter 
—a fact to be carefully noted, as it forms a first and most 
important link in our chain of evidence, thus constituting 
what we shall hereafter revert to as a cultivative process. 
The seed came up well, the plants on ripening were tall 
and robust, and the grains presented a scarcely appre- 
ciable difference from the wild examples, but if anything 
there might have been a slight tendency to increase in the 
quantity of flour. The seeds again collected and preserved 
through the winter were sown in a patch of similar size in 
a different part of the garden in the spring of the following 
years 1853-54-55, with little alteration from year to year, 
though in some examples the following tendencies seemed 
from the first to be gaining strength :— 
1. A Gradual decrease in the quantity of hairs on the 
florets. 
2. A more tumid grain, in which the covering “skin” 
was less coarse and the awn less stout and straighter. 
3. A gradually increased development of kernel or flour. 
The seeds of 1855, without selection, were treated through 
the winter the same as before, and sown in the spring of the 
present year, the resulting crop, gathered in the latter end 
of August, presenting the following curious variations :— 
Proportion of each. 
lst. Avena fatua, wild oat of the true type, with large loose 
panicles of flowers, thin hairy florets, with the bent 
awn twisted at the base... 5 
2nd. Avena fatua, var. sativa, with loose panicles of Aomems, 
florets quite smooth and tumid, with or without 
straight awns, some few examples slightly hairy 
towards the base. This is near the potato-oat type 6 
3rd. Avena fatua, var. sativa. Panicles more compact, 
flowers inclining to one side, grains more tumid 
than 2, quite devoid of hairs, awn straight. These 
present the type of the white Tartarian oat . 12 
