i9io.] 



Improvement of Crops by Selection. 



333 



and about sixty plants were discovered with the indicating 

 hairiness. Of those sixty about thirty turned out after plot 

 trial and analysis to be carrying the correlated characters. 

 Field trials of the second generation produced eight good 

 brewing barleys from the thirty, and further trials extracted 

 from the eight the best — namely, Primus. This Primus is 

 a pure strain of stiff-strawed barley of the very finest quality 

 for brewing, indistinguishable from the best Chevalier 

 varieties. It is now largely grown in Sweden, and has won 

 many prizes. This fine result was reached by a knowledge of 

 the law of correlation ; eight good brewing barleys were avail- 

 able for distribution three years after the first choice was 

 made, for the elimination of the other seven in further tests 

 was only a refinement of selection. This principle of cor- 

 relation has been found applicable to all the farm crops, even 

 to the minor forage crops, and while it sheds a brilliant light 

 to guide the improver of crops and provides a short cut to 

 success, it effectually debars any but the trained specialist 

 from the speedy introduction of new varieties by selection. 



The two main principles of the work at Svalof have been 

 stated ; it remains to describe briefly the means and methods 

 of their application. For the growth of the crops there is 

 plenty of good land and the hundreds of acres of the seed 

 farm if they are required; for the application of the law of 

 correlation there is, first, a storehouse ; second, laboratories 

 and a museum ; and third, a system of book-keeping mar- 

 vellous in its scope and precision. 



The Storehouse. — This is a very large barn-like building, in 

 which the crops are arranged in sheaves or bundles attached 

 to frames which are suspended from the roof. In front of the 

 sheaves are gangways, many feet, it may be, from the ground, 

 enabling the investigator to examine the sheaves without 

 moving them or disturbing their order in the row. Here 

 the first superficial examination is made, and many of the 

 inferior sorts are discarded. 



The Laboratories and Museum. — When the selected plants 

 emerge from the storehouse they have to run the gauntlet of 

 many ingenious instruments, of which the " classificator " is 

 one of the most characteristic. A classificator is a collection 

 of ears, pods, spikelets, grains — what you please. It may be 



