(*Triticum, Encyc.*) has for some years past been at so very high a price, that every hint for increasing its quantity or improving its quality is intitled to notice. In the Leicester Journal for the 6th of December 1799, there is an ingenious paper on the subject of transplanting wheat, as a means of providing against... against the expected scarcity of that necessary of life. It is recommended "to sow, in dry land, at the usual season, as much corn as may be deemed necessary to plant in the spring any number of acres which may be occupied with that article in the following year. When the soil is prepared, a furrow is to be made with a very small plough and one horse, in the centre of the ridge or land, returning back in the same track (this time only of every ridge); then turn towards the left hand, and plough another furrow, about eight or nine inches from the first furrow, turning always to the left hand, till the whole ridge is finished; it will then be formed into trenches, in parallel lines, of about eight or nine inches asunder, and imitate what gardeners term drawing of drills. In these furrows the plants are to be laid." Mr. John Ainworth of Glen, the experienced author of this communication, says he has practised this method with the most complete success.

It has been likewise practised, on a small scale, with equal success, but we know not in what county. About the end of August 1783, that gentleman threw a small quantity of wheat, which near two years before had been steeped and limed (see Wheat, Engels.) into an unmanured corner of his garden. In the beginning of February following he had a piece of ground (also unmanured) dug in an open part of his orchard, and he transplanted it on beds of six rows wide, at nine inches asunder every way. It tillered, and spread over the ground so completely, as to prevent even a weed growing among it. It produced admirable corn, and at the rate of near four quarters per acre.

From accurate calculations which he then made, he found that an acre, supposing the seed to be very good, and the plants set at the distance above mentioned, would require only half a peck of seed.

Besides the sowing of the seed, there are two other material advantages which attend such a method; one is, that some suitable crop may be on the ground all the winter for use; and the other is, that ploughing the ground so late as February, will effectually bury and destroy those weeds which were beginning to vegetate; and before others can spring up, the corn plants have taken to the ground, and so spread over it that the weeds cannot rise, by which means there is a very clean crop, and all the customary expense for weeding is saved.

This author seems to think that wheat will thrive as well, and produce as full a crop, when sown in the spring, as if it had been committed to the ground in the preceding autumn. In the southern counties of England we doubt not but it may; but the case is otherwise in Scotland, where the spring is not so early, and where, from the narrowness of the island, the frost is seldom so severe. We agree, however, with Dr. Pike, in thinking it a pity that the way of setting wheat (as done in Norfolk and Suffolk) is not everywhere more general. The process is indeed tedious and troublesome; and we have often wondered that, among the numberless machines lately contrived to lessen manual labour, none has been invented for dibbling wheat expediently and accurately. We are therefore pleased to learn, that Dr. Pike himself has turned his attention to the subject, and hopes in the course of this year (1820) to present the public with a method of setting wheat at perfectly exact distances through a whole field, and as expeditiously as the common broadcast sowing, which can therefore be applied to farms of any magnitude; and when a peck of seed is found to be sufficient for an acre (and in some land much less), the saving on a large farm must be immense. We trust to the liberality of his profession, that he will not take out a patent for his invention.

Though we have elsewhere given the usual recipes for preventing rust in wheat, it would be improper to conclude this article without mentioning the very simple one which Mr. Wagstaffe of Norwich has uniformly found attended with complete success. This consists in nothing more than immersing the seed in pure water, and repeatedly scouring it therein, just before it is sown or dibbled in the soil. Whether well, spring, or river water be used, is indifferent; but repeated stirring and change of water is essential to remove the particles of infection that may have imperceptibly adhered to the seeds thus purified. The subsequent crop will be perfect in itself, and its seeds, he says, successively so likewise, if there are no adjacent fields from whence this contamination may be waited. He recommends the same washing, and for the same reason, of barley and oats before they be sown.