BOOKINGS GARDEN MANUAL. 



139 



of the good qualities they visibly present, and of the 

 notes of the peculiarities exhibited by each during the 

 whole course of its growth, such as-— the rapidity with 

 which the parent seed germinates ; the manner, time, 

 and extent of the 'tillering' of the plant ; the periods 

 of its earing, blooming, and ripening ; its powers of 

 withstanding disease, frost, wet. d:c. : the toughness of 

 its straw, and any other characteristics which are 

 essential to forming a correct decision, and which cannot 

 be determined by even the most careful inspection of 

 the perfect plant. This best plant is called ' the selec- 

 tion ' of the year (say 1861) in which it is thus obtained, 

 and consists of numerous ears, containing many hun- 

 dreds, and even thousands of grains, which are planted 

 separately, those of each ear being kept quite distinct, 

 as, although the best grain of any plant is nearly 

 always found to lie in the best ear, it may be other- 

 wise, and the successive parent ears must be preserved. 

 At the following harvest (1862). the best plant forms 

 ' the selection of 1862,' and its produce is continued on 

 the experimental ground, while that of the remaining 

 plants furnishes the annual seed for the farm in the 

 autumn of 1862, and the crops are in 1863 offered to 

 the public. Thus, the selection sold is that of 1861, 

 or in any year that of two years before : the latest 

 selection, that of the year immediately preceding, is not 

 sold, being solely employed as the home seed. The sepa- 

 rate ears of a plant are designated by different letters, 

 numbers, or names, as A, Z, &a ; and each, with its 

 descendants, form a 6 family ' which may develop some 

 valuable peculiarity. Thus, all the 4 Pedigree Nursery 

 Wheat ' hitherto sold has been of a family called 1 A/ 

 while another family of the same wheat known as e Z,' 

 having been observed to exhibit marked superiority, 

 has been continued separately, and has given a greater 

 progress during 1862 than has been before obtained in 

 any single year. The original ear ('A') contained up 

 one of its sides 1 6 *' ranks ' fspikelets) of grains, while the 



