450 
HARVESTING WHEAT IN WET SEASONS. 
la 1889 the production of wheat in France -was estimated at 
306,515,682 bushels, which represented more than one-fourth of the 
total estimated product (1,126,686,143 bushels) of Europe, and was 
more than four times as much as the total quantity (75,883,611 
bushels) grown in the United Kingdom. Since, in Europe, France 
occupies the premier position as a wheat-producing country, the 
harvesting of wheat in wet seasons is a problem of high practical 
importance to the French cultivator. The lessons derived from the 
disastrous experiences of the wet summer of 1888, which are 
recorded by 1£ Grandeau in his £tudes agronomiques, deserve the 
attention of wheat-growers in this country. 
The method, preferable to all others, of harvesting wheat in wet 
weather is that which has long been associated with the name of 
Mathieu de Dombasle. It consists in placing the wheat for a longer 
or shorter time in small stacks, before finally stacking it. As dry 
and elevated a site as possible is selected for each small stack. On 
this spot a sheaf is placed upright, its straws are then bent at about 
the middle, and the whole is flattened so tbat the ears are brought 
into contact with the lower extremities of the cut straw ; this con- 
stitutes the base. Around and upon this other sheaves are arranged 
in such a manner that all the ears rest upon the central flattened 
sheaf, though none of them come in contact with the ground, and 
the straws extend fan-like from the centre to the circumference. 
Care is exercised in disposing the outer ends of the sheaves, which 
mark out a circle whose diameter is twice the length of the straw. 
Upon the bed or layer thus formed there is arranged another, then 
another, and so on, the outer wall of the cylindrical stack being 
kept vertical. When a height of a little over two feet has been 
attained, the workman commences to gradually diminish the 
diameter, by pushing the fresh sheaves a little forward, so that the 
ears of successive sheaves now begin to cross each other instead of, 
as heretofore, all radiating from a common centre. As a consequence 
of this, the centre begins to rise more rapidly than the circumference, 
and when the latter has attained the height it should reach, five 
feet, the summit will form a cone with rounded apex. The inclina- 
tion of the sheaves at the top, whilst not enough to permit of their 
slipping off the underlying ones, should be sufficient to cause the rain 
to flow off freely. The structure is completed by placing on the top of 
the cone an inverted sheaf, the straw of which is so spread as to cover 
the upper surface of the small stack, and especially to protect it on the 
side facing the quarter from which rain usually comes. The ears of 
this inverted sheaf thus come to rest upon the cut ends of the straw 
of the uppermost layer of sheaves. 
The value of such a small stack, or meulon, will necessarily 
depend upon the care and skill with which it is put together. In 
France four women carry sheaves to one man, who builds. Such a 
meulon, exposed to long-continued rains, will not be penetrated by 
moisture to a depth of more than two inches, and this rapidly dries 
