148 



at first had excited so much surprise, were the results of 

 natural causes, and necessarily followed from the charac- 

 teristic and unalterable properties with which Nature, at 

 its original formation, had endowed the vegetable . in 

 question. 



The value of every discovery, at least in agriculture, is 

 to be measured by the benefit which man is to derive 

 from it ; that of florin itself, by the great addition it makes 

 to our stock of winter provender for our cattle, by the su- 

 perior luxuriance of its crops, and the greater facility of 

 raising and keeping them up. 



The actual value of the discovery of our power of saving 

 florin hay through the winter months, may not in itself he 

 very great ; yet it enables us to abstain from mowing this 

 grass, until the stolones attain their perfection, that is in 

 October, as we are now secure in saving its hay, whatever 

 severity of weather may occur in the very late season in 

 which we are to make it up. 



This strange practice too may teach gentlemen upt to 

 make so flippant a use of the term impossible, as they often 

 do, unless they mean to apply it in Fielding's sense of 

 the word, " as signifying not only what is veyy probable, 

 hut frequently ivhat has actually happened'.' 



The value of the discovery that florin grass can be 

 cultivated at great elevations, on peaty soil, at light 

 expense, and luxuriant crops of hay raised there, must at 

 first view appear immense, to those who are acquainted with 

 the vast extent of this area in our islands, and who know 

 how miserably the cattle of the inhabitants are stinted in 

 winter provender. How greatly must this value be en- 

 hanced to those who have given credit to the grave 

 positions quoted above, that this whole area is unimprovable 

 even by the efforts of national industry? 



