PEORIA TRANSCRIPT: We prepared a half acre of ground as good as we knew how. Upon one-half of this plat we planted one bushel of seed obtained from Michigan, and upon the other half of home-grown seed, both being of the variety known as Snowflake. The two lots of seed cut for planting were similar in appearance, both as regards size and quality. The whole lot received the same treatment during the growing season. The plants made about the same growth on the two plats and suffered equally from bugs; but when it came to digging, those from new seed yielded two bushels of large potatoes for every one that could be secured on the land planted with seed of our own growing. This difference in yield could be accounted for on no other theory than the change in seed, as the quality of seed, soil, and culture were the same. This leads to the belief that simply procuring seed of favorite varieties from a distance would insure us good crops at much less expense than can be done experimenting with new, high-priced seeds. In another column a Kansas correspondent speaks of the crab grass in an exceedingly favorable way. We find the following regarding this grass in a late New York Times: Every Northern farmer knows the common coarse grass called door-yard grass, which has long, broad leaves, a tough, bunchy root, and a three-fingered spreading head, which contains large, round seeds. It is known as Eleusine Indica, and grows luxuriously in open drains and moist places. It appears late in the summer. This is an extremely valuable grass in the South. A friend who went to Georgia soon after the war bought an abandoned plantation on account of the grass growing upon it. It was this door-yard grass. He pastured sheep upon it and cut some for hay. Northern baled hay was selling at $30 a ton at that time. He wrote asking me to buy him two mowers and a baling press, and went to baling hay for the Southern market, selling his sheep and living an easy life except in haying time. His three hundred acres of cleared land has produced an average of 200 tons of hay every year which gives him about four times as much profit as an acre of cotton would do. Perhaps there may come an end to this business, and the grass will run out for want of fresh seed, but with a yearly dressing of Charleston phosphate the grass has kept up its original vigor. Now why could we not make some use of this grass, and of others, such as quack-grass, which defy so persistently all our efforts to destroy them? [Illustration: Entomological] Insects in Illinois. Prof. Forbes, State Entomologist, makes the following report to the State Board of Agriculture: