OF SCOTLAND.

465

As the well managed districts of Scotland do not afford asufficient number of facts on which to ground conclusions re-specting the culture of summer wheat, it would be improperto load this chapter with information from other sources,especially as such would be altogether extraneous in a gene-ral report of Scotch husbandry. It may only be added,that bread made of the flour of summer wheat is describedas less white than when made from the better kinds of winterwheats; but in Lincolnshire, where it is best known, it issaid to be more palatable. From experiments conducted bySir Humphrey Davy of the ltoyal Institution, summer wheatappears to contain more gluten and more bran, but lesssturch, than good winter wheat. Hence it may be inferred,that bread made of the flour of summer wheat, is more nu-tritious than that made of winter wheat, because summerwheat contains a larger proportion of the gluten or halfanimalised matter. It is also evident, that a miller oughtnot to deduct from the price of summer wheat, more than2 per cent, on the money price of winter wheat of the sameweight, as the excess of the weight of insoluble matter, orbran, is no more than 2 per cent, when compared with goodF.nglish winter wheat. The darker colour, and the morepalatable taste of bread made of summer wheat, are both pro-bably owing to the excess of gluten which it contains *.

Perhaps one of the most valuable purposes to which sum-mer wheat can be applied in Scotch husbandry, is to fill upin spring any blanks or thin spaces that may occur in winter-sown fields, from the effect of frosts, or the ravages of thewire worm; as it may be sown on these even in the first weekof May, when it can be raked into the naked or thin spots,and will certainly ripen as soon as the winter wheat amongwhich it is sown. This is assuredly a much better expedientthan sowing barley among such injured crops of winter

* Commun. to the Board of Agriculture, vol. v, Part i. p, 184.

voi„ i. o (;