HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY OF LONDON. 



131 



deep earth, my first sowing of wild carrot. All came up ; I ob- 

 tained no root better than those of the fields. 



" In 1833, the 26th April, I tried at Barres, Loiret, where the 

 earth is stronger, a new sowing. It sprung up very clean, the 

 plants became very strong, but all still ran to flower. The roots 

 were larger than those of the fields, but I should say, worse on 

 account of their toughness and strong forks. Two other sow- 

 ings, made at Verriere the 15 May and 22 June following, also 

 ran to flower to a great extent, but not entirely. Some seeds 

 however continued to germinate during all the summer, and 

 amongst those late plants, several did not run to flower, and five 

 or six made tolerably fleshy roots, about half an inch in diameter, 

 and resembling very ordinary garden carrots. 



" These roots replanted the following spring produced seeds 

 which were sown in 1835. A considerable portion of this crop 

 still ran to seed, but the proportion was much less than it had 

 previously been. The plant had already experienced a remark- 

 able change ; at the time of drawing the carrots, about a fifth 

 part was found to consist of pretty good roots, small and middle 

 sized, but little fibrous, and some even quite well made. This 

 second generation presented a good choice of stock plants, which 

 were replanted and produced seed in 1836. 



" In 1837 I obtained from these seeds, a third generation very 

 considerably improved ; many were very large and fleshy, some 

 exceeded the weight of a kilogramme. The largest were in 

 general coarse and ill-shaped ; but others were found perfectly 

 good in every respect, equalling the best garden carrots. The 

 refuse of this crop amounted to about a third part, consisting 

 of forked branched roots ; but most even of these were fleshy 

 and eatable. Few plants ran to seed, at most not above a tenth 

 part. In 1838 I made with the same seed a pretty considerable 

 sowing in the fields ; the majority of which has likewise yielded 

 me very good produce. 



'* Last year, 1839, I raised the fourth generation. The roots 

 have been in general smaller than those of 1837, because they 

 have suffered much from drought j but the quality of the whole 

 has been better, the proportion of bad much less, and that of 

 runaways almost nothing." 



In these experiments the author found the carrot disposed im- 

 mediately to change colour. White and yellow, made their 

 appearance simultaneously, so early as the small crop of 1833, 

 and constantly formed part of all the other crops, the first being 

 always in the larger proportion. 



Two roots of a dull violet, or the colour of wine lees, were 

 found in the crop of 1835 5 the red colour appeared for the first 

 time in the third generation in 1837, but in very trifling pro- 

 portion, perhaps one in three or four hundred. 



With regard to the disposition to run, which is so cha- 



