THE NATURALIST. 
VOL. V., NO. XXXVI.—SEPTEMBER, 1839. 
ON THE PRACTICABILITY AND ADVANTAGES OP THE CULTURE 
OP WHEAT WITHIN THE TROPICS, AND MORE ESPECIALLY 
IN THE BRITISH SETTLEMENTS IN THE WEST-INDIES. 
By William Hamilton, M.B. 
The following details, though satisfactory in some respects, are unfortunately 
deficient in that minuteness of detail which is requisite for a correct calculation 
of results. We must, therefore, be contented with such an approximation to the 
truth as can be gleaned from the scanty materials before us. ' The first and most 
important fact which arrests the attention of the reader, is the wide difference of 
habit between the Wheat imported direct from England, and that which had been 
acclimated within the Tropics for about three centuries: a difference the more 
remarkable, and the more difficult of explanation, from the difference between 
the results in this case, and that recorded in the Life of Columbus , in which, 
although the notice is silent on the subject, the experiment may be presumed to 
have been made with Wheat either directly brought from Spain, or which had, at 
the most, been under cultivation within the Tropics for too short a period to 
have had its habits much altered by the influence of climate. From the observa¬ 
tion subjoined to the notice of the English white Wheat sown by the governor, 
we may conclude that the fourteen grains sown produced stalks, but from 
over-luxuriance of vegetation expended the whole of their vigour in the production 
of leaves : while that planted by Mr. Stork failed altogether. The time of 
planting was nearly twelve weeks earlier than that selected by the Spanish 
husbandman on the North coast of San-Domingo, whose seed was sown, as 
Washington Irving acquaints us, “in the latter end of January/’ Hence it 
might, perhaps, be worth while to vary the experiment by planting European 
seed about the same time, and noting the results. The red Wheat equally 
failed, probably from a similar cause; but from Mr. Stork’s account promised, 
by spreading over the surface, to be valuable as pasturage for cattle, if not as 
food for Man. But the failure of the European is more than compensated by the 
results obtained from the Victoria Wheat ; which results Were the same, whether 
the seed was the immediate growth of the vallies of Aragua, or the produce of 
vol. v.— no. xxxvi. 
p 
