Class II.]
53
Koucheleff (32, p. 1367) has sent the greatest variety,and a Prize Medal has been awarded to his collection ingeneral, in which the black wheat and naked barley, &c.,are worthy of particular notice and Honourable Men-tion. Hard white wheat, from Odessa (42, p.1367), exhi-bited by Colonel Shabf.lsky, has been awarded a PrizeMedal. This wheat yields a very large crop, and isnever grown on manured land, which is considered pre-judicial to it. A fine sample of wheat (Arnaout) fromthe Government of Saratoff, exhibited by — Baguer(39, p. 1367), has been awarded a Prize Medal. Blackwheat (37, p. 1367), a very valuable cereal, cultivatedchiefly by the Cossacks of the Azotf Sea ; these samplesare from the estates of Petroffskaja and Novo Spasskaja,and are awarded a Prize Medal.
Oats from English seed, exhibitor M. Selivanoff (52,p. 1368), a Prize Medal.
The following are considered worthy of particularnotice and Honourable Mention :—
Hard wheat of Koubanka(GO, p. 1368), Lieut.-GeneralErshoff; and of Arnaoutka (35, 1367), M. Klepatsky ;pearl barley, Baron Ropp (47, p. 1368); oats, M. Oun-kovsky (54, p. 1368).
A polentum of half-ripe rye demands notice as anovelty to England, though extensively consumed inRussia .
16. Turkey . —A large series of considerable meritillustrates the agriculture'of this country. It is composedof samples of grain in bottles, too scanty for accurate ex-amination; and many are dirty and carelessly collected.Nevertheless as a collection it is well worthy of attention,and one of the samples, a hard wheat (2149, p. 1386),has been awarded a Prize Medal.
17- Egypt . —This country* grows more millets thancorn, but both are copiously illustrated. One sample ofwhite wheat, exhibited by H. II. Abbas Pasha (52,p. 1409), is of admirable quality; it is very large in thegrain, and soft, and has been awarded a Prize Medal.The barley is good.
18. Tunis. —The cereals resemble those of Egypt inkind. Good hard wheats are exhibited, considered ofunusual excellence in that country. The skinless barleydeserves notice.
19. United States of America . —The Agricul-tural Society of New* York receives a Prize Medal fora well-arranged and instructive series (83, p. 1438) of thewheat corn (in ear), generally cultivated in America .This is illustrated by remarks relating to the seasons,soils, and produce, and suggestive of various improve-ments in agriculture.
Among many barrels of fine wheats there is one ofparticular merit, to which a Prize Medal has been awarded;it is a soft white wheat from T. Bell, of Genessee (103,p. 1440), slightly injured by the voyage, but hardly in-ferior to any in the Exhibition. Among other cerealia ofthe same exhibitor, the red Mediterranean wheat deservesnotice. Honourable Mention is made of the wheat ex-hibited by W. Hotchkiss (342, p. 1456).
A. II.— Cerealia rarely cultivated in Europe .
Rice , maize, and the Croix lachri/ma (Job’s tears) arethe chief products that appear to come under this head—millets, &c., being placed in a separate sub-class. Asan article of import, rice holds a very prominent place.Maize , on the other hand, has not found much favour inGreat Britain , its flour, however cheaply imported, havingnever perhaps been sufficiently appreciated.
1. Great Britain. —Rice requires more summer heatthan this climate ever affords. Maize has been repeatedlyexperimented upon, and has been, up to the presenttime, the fruitful subject of speculation and discussion.Though occasionally successful, the crop is very uncer-tain, and always scanty. A fair sample is exhibited bythe Truro Local Committee (71, p. 205).
2. British East Indies. —Copious samples of about50 Indian rices are exhibited by the Honourable EastIndia Company , and to them a Prize Medal is awarded.Many are of good quality, but more are dirty, small,broken in the grain, and unequal; characteristic of theslovenly state of the Indian bazaars. The quality of
many appears only after boiling. In size, colour, andfineness of grain, none are at all comparable to the Caro-lina and Northern Italy rices; several are however verycurious, especially the mountain rices, grown without, irrigation, at elevations of 3,000 to 6,000 feet on theHimalayah, where the dampness of the summer monthscompensates for the want of artificial moisture. The. small reddish Assamese rices which become gelatinous in
• boiling, and the large, fiat-grained, soft, purple-black“Ketana” rice of Java and Malacca are also very curious.The East Indian maizes are inferior in quality, and dete-riorated. Borneo exhibits a large series of rices, someof them curious.
3. "West Indian Possessions.— Rice and maize arethe staple crops here, but except from British Guiana,the contributions are trifling.
4. Australasia. — Maize is exhibited from NewZealand , where it forms an indifferent crop; and fromNorfolk Island .
5. The Cape of Good IIorE exhibits maize of fairquality.
6. France. —The cultivation of rice in Europe is quiteconfined to the Southern States, and chiefly to the bordersof the Mediterranean, where it is extensively grown, and
! is of good quality. Two varieties are exhibited fromBordeax, by A. F£ry (5U5, p. 1203), to whom a PrizeMedal is awarded. One is a beautiful, soft, brittle-bearded rice, irrigated, and called “Nostrana:” the other,unirrigated, is bearded, harder, greyer, and larger in thegrain, and is called “Chinese rice.” Algeria contributesrice and maize of indifferent quality.
7. Spain. —The sample of rice from Valencia (72,
1 p. 1333) is equally good with that of Bordeaux, andj swells much in boiling: it has been awarded a Prize
* Medal. Some good maize is exhibited, as also a sample; of the seeds of Cevchrus spicatas, a cereal little known
in Northern Europe , and of no great value.
8. Portugal . —The Carolina rice of M. Belmontez,
| is of good quality, but badly husked and bruised.
! 9. Sardinia . —The Riz de Piemont il8, p. 1303), ex-
hibited by Bi.oxdel, Gaston, and Co., of the samekind and quality as the Bordeaux, has been awardeda Prize Medal.
j 10. Austria contributes different varieties of maize.
11. Russia.— Much rice, and of good quality, is cul-tivated in the southern provinces of this empire. Two’ samples arc exhibited, one unirrigated, from the moun-1 tainous districts of the Caucasus; the other in the stateof paddy (unhusked) fr^m Odessa. Of the latter, one: specimen called Chaltik, from Khalil Beck (57, p. 1368',exhibited by Zjlfoogar Beck Iskander Beck Oclj, isworthy of Honourable Mention.
; 12. Egypt. —Rice abundant, and of good quality; that
cultivated in the Delta of the Nile , at Rosetta, is con-sidered the best; the grain is broad, short, fiat, andpeculiarly striated.
13. United States of America . —The American rice,though originally imported from the old world, is nowmuch the finest in quality. The Carolina sample of E.T. Heriot(172, p. 1448) is magnificent in size, colour, andcleanness, and has.been awarded a Prize Medal. A beau-tiful sheaf of beardless rice is also exhibited. Maize is amore important crop in North America than in any othercivilized country, being used most extensively for stockfeeding; as flour for cooking; and in various forms attable—green, as well as ripe; toasted, boiled, or baked.The collections from America are very fine, particularlythat of B. B. Kirtland (84, p. 1438), who exhibits 3*4varieties, amongst which are to be found samples of nearlyall those usually cultivated in the United States . A PrizeMedal has been awarded to him.
A. III.— Millet and other small Grains used asFood.
Under this head, besides millets, the Jury have con-sidered buck-wheats: neither are well represented in theExhibition, though of great importance in many parts ofthe world.
Buck-wheat belongs to the * temperate and arcticclimates, and is cultivated in Northern Europe, Asia , and