14 
Bulletin 58. 
accordingly taken on October 3. These were trial samples taken to 
help us in judging of the condition of the crop. We had already 
received a number of samples from the Farm Department, but 
these vaiied greatly, and we did not know from which of the differ¬ 
ent plots the sample had been taken. It was, furthermore, out of 
the question for us to take the plot most nearly representing the 
plot taken for comparison in 1897, for this plot had been hastened 
into ripening by lack of moisture. This was so pronounced, at this 
date, that the tops wilted to the extent of lying flat on the ground. 
The soil was dry to a greater depth than that reached in digging 
the beets. If there had been no other differences, these facts make 
it evident that we cannot compare these plots, so I shall use another 
whose history is as follows: In 1891 it received a dressing of 
manure, was planted to potatoes; 1892, trucked, not manured ; 1893, 
fallow; 1894, rye, crop cut green and removed from plot; 1895- 
’96-97, fallow; 1898, planted to beets but not manured. The 
varieties grown on this plot were Vilmorin Improved, White 
Imperial, White French and Dippe’s Improved Kleinwanzlebener. 
§ 21. In the following table we do not see the pronounced 
increase in the amount of sugar as the season advanced or the crop 
matured, as shown in the crop of 1897, but the season was very 
different. In 1897 we had, in the early part of September, enough 
rain, 0.74 of an inch, to stimulate the beets into an increased 
growth, after a period of comparative inactivity. This produced a 
material increase in the weight of the crop, but the relative quantity 
of sugar was less than before this period. The effect was noticeable 
for two and a half weeks or more, at the end of which period the 
sugar had increased again and reached its maximum for the season. 
In 1898 we had no such an abundance of water as in 1897. We 
were unable to irrigate more than once, and then far less copiously 
than in 1897, and the rainfall from August 6 to October 15, a 
period of 70 days, amounted to only 0.74 of an inch, which is the 
same amount that fell in four days, September 10 to 14, in 1897. 
The crop of 1898 received its moisture from the soil, developed 
continuously under very uniform conditions, and matured without 
showing a so uniformly large gain at the maturing period. In 1897 
this amounted to from 2 to 3.5 per cent.; in 1898 the greatest gain 
for this period was 1.44 per cent, in two weeks. This observation 
is true in regard to the Farm plot as well as for our own. Further¬ 
more, it is observable in the records of the Department that there is 
no such great increase in the percentage of sugar just at the time of 
ripening, unless the beets were already mature at the time of taking 
the first samples, which was not indicated by the deportment of the 
beets when grated, as the earlier samples became very black on 
being exposed to the air. The Department received a sample 
harvested September 27, 1898, original Kleinwanzlebener, which 
