828 
Recent Agricultural Puhlications. 
in the fact that butter, the genuineness of which can be proved, does, 
in exceptional instances, give on analysis results which may differ 
materially from the average results. As M. Zune remarks, it is 
better to let a hundred guilty escape punishment than to punish 
one innocent. Still, too much stress must not be put on the fact 
that, occasionally, pure butters give abnormal results. It is the 
knowledge of this fact that enables the adulteration of butter to be 
proceeded with on the wholesale scale at present practised. A 
very large proportion of the butter imported into this country from 
abroad is scientifically and systematically “ let down,” as it is 
termed, by admixture of margarine in small quantities. Tlie in- 
troduction of even 5 to 10 per cent, of margarine makes a great 
difference in the profits, and enables the manufacturers to undersell 
those who honestly produce pure butter. 
The difficulty of the public analyst is that, although he may 
rightly suspect the admixture of margarine in small quantities, yet 
his report is liable to be upset on the ground that the butter in 
question might be abnormal. One important point must not be 
lost sight of. Butter as produced on a large scale in factories is 
not the produce of a single exceptional animal, nor even of a single 
herd of cows, but is a product from many different farms and 
small factories. Any occasional abnormality of composition will 
accordingly be lost in the overwhelming proportion of butter of 
normal composition. 
Edward William Voelcker. 
SEEDS AND SEEDLINGS.' 
“No one who has ever looked at seedlings can fail to have been 
struck by the contrasts which the cotyledons afford, not only to the 
final leaves, but even to those by which they are immediately 
followed. 
“ Let us then take certain plants (especially, as far as possible, the 
most familiar), and see what light can be thrown on the varied forms 
which their seedlings present. Look, for instance, at the familiar 
Mustard and Cress ; the first (fig. 1) has kidney-shaped cotyledons, 
one of them rather larger than the other ; while the Cress, on the 
other hand, has the cotyledons (fig. 2) divided into three lobes. The 
Pink has broad cotyledons, the Chickweed narrow ones ; those of 
the Beech are (fig. 3) fan-shaped in outline ; those of the Sycamore 
shaped almost like a knife-blade ; those of Eschscholtzia divided 
like a hayfork ; those of the Bean or Acorn thick and fleshy. 
“Mustard and Cress were the delight and wonder of our child- 
hood ; but at that time it never occurred, to me at lea.st, to ask why 
they were formed as they are, and why they differed so much. So 
‘ A Contribution to our Knowledge of Seedlings. By the Biglit lion. Sir 
John Lubbock, Bart., M.P., F.R.S., D.C.L., LL.U. In two volumes. Pages 
viii. -t- 608 -h 646. With 684 figures in text. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, 
Triibner, & Co., Ltd. 1892. 
