250 Varieties of WJieat and Methods of Improving them. 
and furnislied with short straight awns at the point. The grain 
is yellow or reddish, middle-sized and full. A leading character- 
istic of Sliirretf "s Square Headed Wheat is its hardiness. It rarely 
suffers from the prolonged cold or the frosts of spring, an 
exemption which is no doubt partly due to its slowness in 
commencing growth at that season. The short, stout straw is 
well able to support the stout ears of this variety, and there 
is probably no other kind of wheat which is so little 
liable to become laid. Its qualities specially adapt it for 
resisting the evil effects of a humid climate, and its popularity 
in this and some other countries, especially in clay soils, is not 
therefore surprising. In such a variety a number of synonyms 
might naturally be looked for, and accordingly we find among 
several other French and English wheats closely resembling it 
Scholey's Selected Squai-e Head, Webb's Selected Square Head, 
and Clover Red Winter Wheat. 
The wheat called Thichset, from its close and compact ear, 
is classed in Vilmorin's Cafalogue Sijnonymique des Bles in the 
same section as the above. There are several synonyms in 
French and English, and the name of Mr. Samuel Hickling, of 
Carston, Norfolk, seems to have been placed at the head of the 
list, in consequence of his having discovered or selected this 
wheat in 1830. It does not yield well in cold or tenacious 
clays, and, although it was held at one time in high favour in 
Norfolk, it has for some time past been supplanted by Square 
Headed Wheat. A defect in Thickset Wheat is that the spikelets 
at the top of the ear break off easily in thrashing, and cannot 
readily be separated from the sample. 
White Wheat of Ilimgarj/, having a compact ear, white grain, 
and very stiff straw, is similar to Lawson's and Le Couteur's 
Archers Brolific and Gluh, which has been introduced into 
France, and is now largely cultivated in the light calcareous 
plains of the central part of that country, where the climate is 
dry. It is not liable to rust nor to become laid ; but in strong 
soils it does not find the conditions that suit it. The same 
wheat appears in the catalogue of an English seed-merchant as 
Selected Hardcastle ; and a closely allied and excellent prolific 
sort, called Roseau in France, was exhibited by Mr. Webb at 
the Great Exhibition of 1851 under the name of Free Trade 
Wlicat ; while another family connection is known across the 
Atlantic as Canadian Winter Flint Wheat. Another sub-variety 
of the same wheat, with a larger ear, is described in various 
lists and catalogues as Big Club Wheat (of Oregon), lAitle Club, 
Wliite Club, Oregon Wheat, Ostend Wheat, Chili Wheat, and 
Thibet Wheat. 
