•D*  RURAL.  NEW-YORKER 
1093 
Seeds  From  Pharaoh’s  Tomb;  Mummy 
Wheat 
Only  the  other  day  someone  told  us  of 
a  wonderful  new  wheat  which  came  from 
seed  found  in  an  Egyptian  tomb,  and 
which  must  be  at  least  3,000  years  old 
when  planted.  The  man  actually  be¬ 
lieved  that  such  old  seed  sprouted  and 
grew,  and  produced  wheat  of  both  su¬ 
perior  and  supernatural  power.  There 
are  thousands  more  who  fully  believe 
such  things.  There  is  no  use  trying  to 
argue  with  them — they  cannot  be  con¬ 
vinced,  but  very  likely  they  will  be  in¬ 
terested  in  the  following  article  by  Dr. 
C.  S.  Gager,  which  appeared  in  the  New 
York  Su7i. 
The  recent  archaeological  studies  at 
the  tomb  of  Tut-ankh-Amen  have  revived 
the  stories  of  the  germination  of  so-called 
“mummy  wheat.”  'Within  a  week  or  two, 
a  notice  has  appeared  in  New  York  pa¬ 
pers  that  seeds  have  been  brought  back 
to  this  city  from  ancient  Egyptian  tombs 
and  that  experiments  will  be  made  to 
test  their  power  of  germination.  The  old 
question  of  mummy  wheat  is  thus  again 
revived,  and  people  are  asking  the  Brook¬ 
lyn  Botanical  Garden,  “How  long  will  a 
seed  live?” 
In  order  to  think  intelligently  on  this 
question  we  must  know  what  a  seed  is. 
seeds  were  tested  to  see  if  they  would 
germinate.  The  results  of  his  long  ex¬ 
periment  were  published  in  1905.  The 
experiment  is  still  in  progress,  enough 
seeds  being  still  buried  to  allow  tests  at 
five-year  intervals  for  60  years  more.  The 
last  report  on  this  experiment  was  pub¬ 
lished  in  May,  1922,  by  Dr.  Darlington. 
At  the  end  of  40  years  the  seeds  of  only 
10  species  would  germinate  at  all. 
In  other  experiments,  carried  out  with 
great  care,  it  has  been  conclusively 
proven  that  of  several  hundred  wheat 
gfains  stored  under  the  best  conditions 
only  8  per  cent  would  germinate  at  the 
end  of  16  years,  and  that  at  the  end  of 
30-35  years  not  a  single  seed  would  germi¬ 
nate.  Microscopic  examination  also 
showed  beyond  the  shadow  of  a  doubt 
that  the  embryos  of  these  seeds  were 
dead. 
In  1907  the  French  botanist,  Becquerel, 
tested  the  germination  of  some  500  dif¬ 
ferent  kinds  of  seed  preserved  in  the  Na¬ 
tural  History  Museum  of  Paris.  The 
ages  of  these  seeds  varied  from  25  to  135 
years.  Out  of  all  the  seeds  tested  none 
germinated  that  was  over  87  years  old. 
Seeds  found  in  the  Indian  mounds  of 
Missouri  and  known  to  be  at  least  more 
than  100  years  old  cannot  be  made  to 
germinate. 
How  then  can  we  explain  the  case  of 
the  mummy  wheat?  In  1921  newspapers 
It  was  less  than  nine  months  ago  that  there  appeared  in  Tiie  R.  N.-Y.  two  or 
three  communications  concerning  a  market  for  fire  logs  and  fuel  for  city  open 
fireplaces.  These  inquiries  brought  responses  from  farmers  who  had  no  other  use 
for  wood  on  their  'farms  that  they  were  anxious  to  sell  to  fuel  dealers.  Since  then 
some  of  the  fuel  dealers  have  taken  the  hint  and  are  carrying  several  different  sizes 
of  wood.  For  a  time  wood  for  this  purpose  was  so  scarce  at  the  wood  and  coal 
yards  that  the  demand  actually  created  a  business,  that  of  employing  buzz  saws 
and  the  power  of  tractors  to  cut  up  fallen  trees  and  blown-off  branches  in  city 
yards.  Within  the  last  building  season  chimneys  with  wider  and  more  fireplace 
have  been  built  and  are  still  building,  all  with  maws,  that  eat  up  hundreds  of  cords 
or  tons  of  wood. — j.  l.  graff. 
Essentially,  a  seed  is  an  embryonic 
plant  inclosed  in  various  tissues,  accord¬ 
ing  to  the  kind  of  a  seed  it  is.  Some 
seeds  like  the  castor  oil  seed,  have  nour¬ 
ishment  stored  between  the  embryo  and 
the  skin.  In  the  bean  seed  the  nourish¬ 
ment,  is  stored  within  the  embryo  leaves; 
that  is  what  makes  them  so  thick.  When 
good  seeds  are  planted,  as  everyone 
knows,  they  germinate  and  eventually 
are  like  the  one  from  which  the  seed  came. 
Now,  it  is  one  of  the  fundamental 
truths  of  biology  that  all  life  comes  from 
pre-existing  life. 
But  what  does  it  mean  to  be  alive? 
No  one  knows  the  complete  answer  to  the 
question.  But  this  we  do  know,  that 
every  living  thing  continually  takes  in 
and  gives  off  oxygen.  This  process,  never 
ceases  in  living  matter ;  we  call  it  res¬ 
piration. 
But,  when  we  (and  plants)  respire, 
the  oxygen  unites  with  living  tissue  and 
consumes  it.  That  is  why  we  need  to 
continue  eating,  even  after  we  have  at¬ 
tained  our  growth.  We  must  supply  ma¬ 
terial  to  take  the  place  of  that  which  is 
destroyed  by  respiration.  By  the  magic 
touch  of  protoplasm,  non-living  food  can 
be  converted  into  living  matter. 
It  requires  only  a  little  thought  on 
anyone’s  part  to  see  that,  if  a  tiny  em¬ 
bryo  plant  such,  for  example,  as  a  grain 
of  wheat  contains,  is  continually  losing 
its  substance  by  respiration,  and  if  no 
new  substance  is  being  taken  in  as  nour¬ 
ishment,  the  seed  will,  in  time,  have  all 
its  living  substance  oxidized.  When  this 
results  the  seed  will  be  dead  and  no  long¬ 
er  capable  of  germination. 
Some  seeds  respire  more  rapidly  than 
others,  even  under  the  same  conditions, 
and  so  some  seeds  are  useless  for  plant¬ 
ing  after  one  year  or  less ;  others  will 
remain  viable  for  several  years.  Seeds 
of  certain  species  of  pine  trees  have 
been  found  to  germinate  after  remaining 
stored  in  the  pine  cone  for  30  years.  But 
how  long  will  a  seed  remain  alive? 
In  the  Fall  of  1879  Prof.  W.  J.  Beal, 
then  a  young  man  in  the  Michigan  Agri¬ 
cultural  College,  started  an  experiment 
to  find  the  answer  to  this  question.  He 
selected  50  seeds  of  23  different  kinds  of 
plants  and  buried  them  in  moist  sand  in 
bottles  in  a  sandy  knoll.  At  the  end  of 
5,  10,  15,  20  and  25  years  sets  of  these 
in  England  carried  news  items  that  oats 
removed  from  a  mummy  case  known  to 
be  2,600  years  old  had  germinated.  This 
mummy,  in  an  unopened  case,  had  been 
presented  by  Khedive  Ismail  to  John 
(Rob  Roy)  Macgregor.  The  case  was 
opened  in  England  in  the  presence  of  re¬ 
liable  witnesses  and  four  oats  were  found 
among  considerable  dust  at  the  bottom 
of  the  case.  All  four  seeds  readily 
germinated,  two  of  them  producing  plants 
that  bore  fruit — that  is,  other  oat  grains. 
When  the  matter  was  carefully  in¬ 
vestigated  it  was  ascertained  that  this 
Khedive  had  stored  numerous  mummy 
cases  in  the  palace  stables  near  the  oats 
used  to  'feed  the  horses.  It  was  his  cus¬ 
tom  to  present  mummies  as  gifts  to  his 
more  distinguished  visitors.  The  rough 
handling,  aided  by  the  dry  air  of  the 
stables,  developed  cracks  in  the  cases  or 
caused  the  clay  inserted  between  the  two 
halves  to  break,  and  fresh  oats  filtered  in. 
Twelve  is  a  favorite  number  of  seeds  to 
be  designated  in  these  mummy  stories. 
There  was  also  a  story  to  the  effect 
that  12  morning-glory  seeds  found  In 
the  hand  of  the  mummy  of  a  young 
Egyptian  girl  were  brought  to  England, 
and  though  said  to  be  5,000  years  old 
the  seeds  all  germinated,  the  plants  bear¬ 
ing  blue  morning-glories  resembling  a 
tiny  Egyptian  face !  According  to  an¬ 
other  version  the  seeds  were  sweet  peas. 
The  “mummy  pea”  story  is  also  a  classic. 
In  1863  the  Presse  Pcientifique  des 
Deux  Mondes  gave  an  account  of  experi¬ 
ments  by  Figari  Bey,  in  which  it  was 
demonstrated  that  wheat  and  barley 
found  in  ancient  Egyptian  tombs  and 
purporting  to  be  nearly  3,000  years  old 
could  not  be  made  to  germinate.  Evi¬ 
dence  was  obtained  in  this  case  also  that 
grains  of  so-called  mummy  wheat  that 
did  germinate  were  modern  grains  that 
had  by  accident,  or  otherwise,  got  into 
the  seed  bed. 
Notwithstanding  the  inherent  improb¬ 
ability  and  the  experimental  evidence 
against  the  germination  of  seeds  several 
hundred  or  several  thousand  years  old. 
there  are  still  people  who  prefer  to  be¬ 
lieve  the  myth. 
Fifty  Dutch  farmers  have  come  to 
America  to  escape  taxation.  Ah.  they  lit¬ 
tle  know  ! — New  York  Evening  Mail. 
Potash  pays — on  “dollar  wheat!” 
NEW  York  State  raised 
8,678,000  bushels  of 
winter  wheat  last  season,  an 
average  of  19H  bushels  per 
acre.  Were  you  above  or 
below  the  average  ? 
With  “dollar  wheat,”  you  must 
increase  the  yield-per-acre  if  you 
are  to  make  a  profit.  Don’t 
worry  about  the  wheat  market — 
it  is  not  the  price  but  the  yield  that 
counts;  it  costs  just  as  much  to 
raise  a  small  crop  as  it  does  a 
large  one.  A  few  bushels  more 
from  each  acre  mean  the  differ¬ 
ence  between  profit  and  loss. 
Wheat  is  one  of  th  e  most  profit¬ 
able  crops  to  fertilize,  because 
a  small  increased  yield  not  only 
pays  for  the  fertilizer  but  leaves 
a  real  profit. 
A  fertilizer  containing  a  high 
unit  of  potash 
will  pay  even 
with  wheat  at 
a  dollar.  A 
common  win¬ 
ter  wheat  for¬ 
mula  is3- 10-2)4  • 
A  recent  series 
of  experiments 
proved  that  it 
was  very  profit¬ 
able  to  increase 
the  potash  in 
this  formula. 
The  results  were  : 
300  lbs.  of  3-10-2^^  to  the 
acre  produced  24  bushels. 
300  lbs.  of  3-10-5  to  the  acre 
produced  31  bushels. 
This  shows  a  positive  increased 
yield  of  7  bushels  to  the  acre. 
Even  at  80c  these  7  bushels  are 
worth  $5.60,  but  the  2)4  additional 
units  of  potash  cost  only  6 oc,  mak¬ 
ing  a  net  profit  created  by  the  ad¬ 
ditional  potash  of  $5. 00  per  acre. 
Buy  mixed  fertilizer,  but  be 
sure  the  potash  unit  is  high.  Pot - 
ash  Pays.  It  not  only  lengthens 
the  head  and  makes  plump,  hard 
grain  that  does  not  shrink  in  dry¬ 
ing,  but  it  will  help  you  get  a 
good  stand  of  clover  or  grass. 
German  Potash  is  plentiful 
now.  You  can  get  it  if  you  want  it. 
Your  dealer  has  Genuine  Ger¬ 
man  potash  in  stock,  either  in  the 
form  of  mixed  fertilizer  or  in  200 
pound  sacks.  Should  he  be  tem¬ 
porarily  out  of  it,  write  us  and 
we  will  tell  you  how  and  where 
to  get  it  in  the  grade  you  wish. 
Since  May  1, 1923,  the  distribu¬ 
tion  of  German  Potash,  formerly 
managed  in  this  country  by  the 
German  Kali  Works  and  the 
Potash  Syndicate,  has  been  con¬ 
trolled  by  the 
POTASH  IMPORTING  COR¬ 
PORATION  OF  AMERICA 
NEW  YORK 
B-107 
Genuine  German 
POTASH 
Organized  Co-operation 
A  NEW  BOOK 
By  JOHN  J 
This  book  is  written  in  three 
parts. 
PART  ONE.— The  Develop¬ 
ment  of  the  Agricultural  Indus¬ 
try.  In  five  chapters. 
PART  TWO.  —  Fundamental 
Principles  and  Adaptable  Forms 
of  Co-operative  Organization.  In 
ten  chapters. 
PART  THREE.  —  Application 
of  Co-operation  to  Efficient  and 
Economic  Distribution  of  Farm 
Products.  In  seven  chapters. 
This  is  a  new  treatment  of  the 
co-operative  subject.  Heretofore 
writers  of  books  have  contented 
. DILLON 
themselves  with  accounts  of  co¬ 
operative  work  where  established. 
It  has  been  mostly  propaganda 
and  exhortation.  This  was  all 
good  in  its  time.  But  we  have 
grown  beyond  it.  Farmers  are 
now  committed  to  co-operation. 
Once  shy  of  it,  they  are  at  last  a 
unit  for  it.  What  they  want  now 
is  principles  and  definite  policies 
that  have  pr.  ved  successful.  This 
book  is  the  first  real  attempt  to 
supply  this  want.  Other,  and  it 
is  to  be  hoped  better,  books  will 
follow  on  this  line;  but  for  the 
present  there  is  no  other  book 
seriously  treating  the  subject  of 
organized  co-operation. 
Bound  in  Cloth  Price  $1.00 
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