198 
Our Climate and our Wheat-Crops. 
the number of the so-reckoned rainj days in those three months, 
was exceeded only at Cambridge, though the total amount of 
rain there was less. In the night of August 2-3, a thunder- 
storm of great severity occurred, during which 3 inches or more 
of rain fell within a very few hours. With such a season we 
could obviously expect nothing but disaster to the wheat-crop ; 
and from the comparisons given we should be prepared to find 
that the injury was greater at Rothamsted than in many other 
places. 
The next Table (VIII.) shows the produce on some selected 
plots in the permanent wheat-field at Rothamsted in 1879, com- 
pared with the average on the same plots, and with the same 
manures every year, over the previous twenty-seven years : — 
Table VIII. — Peoddce of Wheat on selected Plots at Eothamsted. 
in 1879, compared with the Average of 27 Years. 
Dressed Corn. 
1 
Straw per Acre. 
Quantity per Acre. 
Weight per Bushel. 
Average 
27 Vears, 
1852- 78. 
1879. 
Average 
27 Years, 
1852-'78. 
1879. 
Average 
27 Years, 
1852-'78. 
1879. 
Plot 3. Unmanured .. 
Bushels. 
13i 
Bushels. 
lbs. 
57-9 
lbs. 
52-5 
Cwts. 
Ill 
Cwts. 
6| 
Plot 2. Farmyard-Mauure 
M\ 
16 
60-1 
56-8 
32| 
20 
(Mineral manure andj 
Plot 7.| 400 lbs. ammonia-) 
33J 
161 
59-5 
56-7 
' 33J 
26i 
(Mineral manure and j 
Plot 8. < 600 lbs. ammonia- > 
361 
20i 
59-2 
56-5 
40i 
m 
(Mineral manure and) 
Plot 9.] 550 lbs. nitrate 
38J* 
22 
j 59-2* 
56'5 
431* 
38i 
* Average of 24 years only instead of 27, as the exact manures stated were 
not applied to Plot 9 during the lust 3 years of the 27. 
We shall have to consider further on whether, or in what degree, 
there was a tendency to diminished or to increased produce 
on these several plots from year to year due, irrespectively of 
the influence of season, to gradual exhaustion on the one hand, 
or to accumulation by the continuous application of the respec- 
tive manures on the other. It will be sufficient here to call 
attention to the great deficiency, both in the quantity and the 
quality of the produce, in 1879, compared with the average, on 
