8%igivr-Beet Cultivation vn Austria. 
335 
These accidental valuable qualities, by careful selection, have 
become fixed, and are associated with certain external properties 
which have thus come to be regarded as distinguishing charac- 
teristics. The shape and size of tlie beet, its colour, the 
character of the foliage, whether erect or spreading, &c., are 
the most frequent marks of distinction. The varieties are fre- 
quently designated by the names of those who have developed 
them, or by the name of the town or locality in which they have 
been grown, or by their colour. 
The importance of proper selection of the variety or race of 
the beet to be grown for sugar is strongly insisted upon by all 
writers on the subject. A beet giving a large cultural yield, 
rich in sugar, involves no more cost to the grower in its pro- 
duction than one giving a small yield and low saccharine value. 
It is therefore desirable to choose those varieties which will 
give the largest returns, and be at the same time the most 
satisfactory in every way to the grower who has to produce 
them, and to the manufacturer who has to extract the sugar. 
Experience shows that roots of moderate size yield a juice 
which contains a smaller percentage of mineral and organic 
impurities and affords a greater yield of sugar than larger ones ; 
and it appears to be regarded almost as an axiom that the smaller 
the beet the richer in sugar. 
Up to a certain point, this is true. The great richness in 
sugar of a beet depends upon the absence of zones of purely 
cellular tissue, and the predominance of fibrous tissue more 
dense and more slowly formed. But it is not less true that 
between roots of the same richness, there may exist consider- 
able differences of weight and size, and the great object of the 
improved varieties is to harmonise as far as possible the qualities 
of cultural yield and industrial value. 
Quality being so important a feature in the cultivation of 
the beet, the utmost care is taken to sow only those varieties 
that can be relied upon for good results ; and to the selection 
and improvement of seeds, having these characteristics, an 
enormous amount of care and study has been devoted by 
scientists, seed-merchants, and producers. 
When the question of sugar-beet growing in England was 
first brought prominently forward by Mr. Duncan's bold but 
unsuccessful experiment at Lavenham, about twenty years ago, 
the kind of beet most in favour with Continental growers was 
the Silesian (see Fig. 1), on account of its free yield of roots 
and vigorous growth. The interest of this kind is now, how- 
ever, little more than historical ; for in the course of the last 
twenty years it (with its sub-varieties of Magdeburg, Breslau, 
