26 



Report on the Diseases of Wheat 



the rust was prevalent in a piece of golden-drop wheat sown the first week 

 of November, 1839 : but more especially in the headlands near a hedge on 

 one side of the ground. The weather, however, appeared afterwards to be 

 against the advance of the disease, but still my interest was excited, and I 

 frequently inspected this particular headland. The fence was low about 

 three parts of the way down, but thick and of a considerable height in the 

 remaining part. About the latter end of July I perceived the wheat in this 

 portion of the field, immediately within the inlluence of the hedge, assume ^ 

 dark colour, speckled about the ear, and by about the 14th of August, when 

 the field was reaped, it had the appearance of being infected by this fungus : 

 may not, then, this disease have been superinduced upon the rust, owing 

 to the want of a free circulation of air, which the remaining parts of the 

 field enjoyed ? 



W. Miles. 



II. — On Subsoil-Ploughing. By H. S. Thompson^ Esq. 



{Taken, by permission, from the Transactions of the Yorkshire 

 Agricultural Society.'] 



Public opinion is still much divided on the subject of subsoil- 

 ploughing. Some very eminent farmers maintain that it is lost 

 labour ; while others, equally eminent, think no system of hus- 

 bandry complete mthout it. When men of sense and experience 

 differ respecting matters of fact which have come under their own 

 observation, it will generally be found that, like the travellers 

 disputing about the colour of a chameleon, neither would be 

 wrong if he would only allow his opponent to be right. To take 

 a case in point ; — one farmer of my acquaintance drained deep, 

 and used the subsoil-plough with every precaution and care, yet 

 found it fail ; another, following precisely the same plan, perma- 

 nently improved the texture of the soil : both were anxious that 

 their friends should profit by either the example or the warning, 

 and lost no opportunity of making the result public. For want 

 of a better term, both experiments were said to have been made 

 on stiff soils : both are credible men ; and the natural result of 

 such conflicting testimonies is, that the question remains unde- 

 cided. Here we feel the want of some acknowledged classifica- 

 tion of soils founded on chemical analysis. No two witnesses 

 could be more directly at issue than those alluded to above : and 

 very possibly, both one and the other may have been quoted by 

 the supporters or opposers of the subsoil-pfough as triumphantly 

 establishing their position. The moment, however, that the two 

 experiments are referred to their place in the geological map the 



