But the _melting_ quality of the grain, which is of more consequence to the brewer and distiller, is modified chiefly by the proportion of gluten which the barley contains. That which contains the least gluten, and therefore the most starch, will melt the most easily and the most completely, and will yield the strongest beer or spirit from the same quantity of grain. Hence the preference given by the brewer to the malt of particular districts, even where the sample appears otherwise inferior. Thus the brewers on the sea-board of the county of Durham will not purchase the barley of their own neighbourhood, while Norfolk grain can be had at a moderate increase of price. But that which refuses to melt well in the hands of the brewer, will cause pigs and other stock to thrive well in the hands of the feeder, and this is the chief outlet for the barley which the brewer and distiller reject. So far as a practical deduction can be drawn from the effects of different manures on the proportion of gluten in barley, it would appear that the larger the quantity of cow dung contained in the manure applied to barley land—in other words, _the greater the numbers of stock folded about the farm-yard, the more likely is the barley to be such as will bring a high price from the brewer_. The folding of _sheep_ produces a larger return (p. 206), from the barley crop—while the folding of _cattle_ gives grain of a better malting quality. SECTION III.—INFLUENCE OF THE TIME OF CUTTING, ON THE QUANTITY AND QUALITY OF THE PRODUCE. The period at which hay is cut, or corn reaped, materially affects the quantity (by weight) and the quality of the produce. It is commonly known that when radishes are left too long in the ground they become hard and woody—that the soft turnippy stem of the young cabbage undergoes a similar change as the plant grows old,—and that the artichoke becomes tough and uneatable if left too long uncut. The same natural change goes on in the grasses which are cut for hay. In the blades and stems of the young grasses there is much sugar, which, as they grow up, is gradually changed, first into starch, and then into woody fibre (pages 44 and 45.) The more completely the latter change is effected—that is, the riper the plant becomes—the less sugar and starch, both readily soluble substances, they contain. And though it has been ascertained that woody fibre is not wholly indigestible, but that the cow, for example, can appropriate a portion of it for food as it passes through her stomach; yet the reader will readily imagine, that those parts of the food which dissolve most easily, are also likely—other things being equal—to be most nourishing to the animal.