558 
Seed-Breeding. 
[August, 
ferences which may prevail in the same neighbourhood. 
Hence how to increase the corn crop is an important ques- 
tion. This cannot be done by manuring alone, or by culture 
alone, but through the intervention of seed selection. If 
we plant a kernel of corn by itself, and dung it and care for 
it, we are sure to have an ear produced from it ; and yet if 
this same kernel be planted in a field where it has to over- 
come disadvantages arising from the presence of other 
plants, and less of individual condition concentrated in 
itself, we are not as sure. In field culture we always find 
barren stalks in greater or less number, according to variety ; 
we always find small ears — pig corn as we call them — no 
matter the amount of fertility ; we always find perfectly 
formed and shapely ears scarce. This fa(ft of non-produdtive 
plants can be proven by a calculation of the amount of grain 
which would be harvested from fields variously planted, 
provided each stalk furnished one first-class ear. 
To plant an acre in hills 3^ x 3^ feet distance, and four 
kernels in a hill, requires 14,224 kernels of corn. If each 
produced one stalk only, and one good ear shelling 7 ounces 
of corn, — not an impossible amount for a first-class ear, — 
the yield would be 111 bushels. If the acre be planted in 
drills, 3J feet apart, and hills every 28 inches, containing 
four kernels, the number of hills planted is 5335, the number 
of kernels 21,340, and the yield in the same supposition of 
7 ounces would be 165 bushels. As a matter of fa( 5 t it is 
not uncommon to harvest 3 lbs. of ears from a hill of three 
kernels, and 4 lbs. from a selected hill of four kernels, or 
1 lb. of corn in the ear to a kernel planted. If we accept 
this as a maximum our yield would, on the suppositions 
above, be 355 bushels of ears (40 lbs.) and 533 bushels of 
ears per acre. 
These calculations are not offered to show the crop that 
may be grown, but simply to illustrate the difference we find 
in practice between our ordinary yields and yields from the 
best hills of our field, in order to make evident the proposi- 
tion that improvement in our seed-corn is needed, and that 
each farmer can find in his field the hint for the direction of 
this improvement. Whatever man can improve his seed so 
that every plant shall be the equal to the best of his planting 
has accomplished the difficult and scientific feat of the 
formation of a variety which is at present beyond aught 
that we have reached. 
Now manure will not cause prolificacy to an equal extent 
in corn plants from various seed, as we have shown that 
under excessive manuring the variation in cmp between 
