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by the lorce of Nature alone, produce crops equal to the 

 best I myself could raise, with all my experience of the 

 habits of this grass, and the culture adapted to it ? And 

 to make the paradox the more revolting, that this could 

 be done on our icorst more eftectually than on our better 

 grounds, and best of all on the area pronounced by the 

 wise writers 1 hav e quoted, to he incapable of impi'oveinent 

 by the efforts of national industry ? 



The position that I could save my fiorin hay with ease 

 through the brumal months, had sufficiently strained my 

 credit, to discourage me from hazarding a new paradox : 

 yet, as in this case I had been able to prove from sound 

 philosophical principles, that the antiseptic quality of fiorin 

 hay, by which it was protected from spoiling like other hay 

 when exposed to severe weather, was a necessary conse- 

 quence of the singular properties with which Nature had 

 endowed fiorin grass. 



In like manner I shall be able to shew, in the case of this 

 new paradox, that the facility of raising spontaneous crops 

 of fiorin at great elevations, is also a necessary consequence 

 of the habits and properties of this agrostis, of which we 

 are able to avail ourselves when thoroughly acquainted 

 with the steady and regular process of Nature, in clothing 

 our surfaces with a grassy sole. 



The circumstances that led to the discovery of these 

 two paradoxes, and to the establishment of their truth, 

 wer« the same in both cases. Solitai'y facts obtruded 

 themselves, attracted notice, and excited curiosity ; expe- 

 riments followed, and soon shewed, that ^what might have 

 been taken for solitary instances, were in the regular course 

 of things, and the steady process of Nature. 



The next step was to develope the priujciples upon which 

 each of these strange paradoxes depended ; and I suc- 

 ceeded in both, being able to prove that the effects, which 



