16 
POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
grain, for we have abundant stock of these varieties at home, as 
would long’ ago have been known to farmers in general, if either 
of them had deserved a more extended cultivation.” 
There is an old couplet which informs us, that — 
“ Turkey, carp, hops, pickerel, and beer, 
Came into England all in one year.” 
Now, as we incline to the belief that beer was known in 
England before turkey, carp, or hops, it is not improbable that 
this refers to the introduction of the here, or big-barley, which 
latter is, in fact, still much grown in Scotland, being favoured 
by the climate; but the two-rowed variety not only grows 
better in England, but commands a higher price. 
In bringing these notes on Corn to a conclusion, we would 
express the hope that our remarks have not been of too pro- 
fessional or technical a character for the readers of this Journal. 
To some extent they have been necessarily so, for it would 
otherwise have been impossible for us to draw attention to the 
all-important fact, that the corn-grasses are useful in conse- 
quence of the size and variety of the grain, and that these 
desiderata have only been acquired by careful cultivation. 
Reference might indeed be made to many more general truths 
in connection with the subject. It is our belief, on which we 
might have enlarged, that the production of more delicate and 
finer sorts of grains of every kind accompany a more extended 
civilization and a better class of farming ; in fact, that grain is 
as susceptible .of cultivation as is man himself, and that the one 
can no more remain at a standstill than the other. Nay, we 
may even carry the analogy still farther ; for a degree of over- 
refinement in the plant is as productive of disease and degene- 
ration as in the human being’, so closely does the history of 
corn appear to be allied to that of our race. 
Nor must it be supposed that the professional man is inca- 
pable of regarding the object of his studies solely in a utilitarian 
spirit — that he does not see in it something beyond mere 
drudgery: A “harvest home” is to us, at least, as joyful a 
spectacle as to the farmer whose grain is housed, and, we 
venture to say, in many instances, a more instructive one. 
“ The harvest song we would repeat : 
‘ Thou givest us the finest wheat 
‘ The joy of harvest’ we have known ; 
The praise, 0 Lord ! is all thine own. 
“ Our tables spread, our garners stored ; 
0 '! give us hearts to bless thee, Lord ! 
Forbid it, Source of light and love, 
That hearts and lives should barren prove.” 
