As regards barley, if our crop is required for home use for feeding purposes, we should cut at least a week earlier than most people, and we should have as good feeding quality, without loss from winds, loss in harvesting, and from birds; but, if our land grows malting barley, the sample will be a better, and more uniform in germinating, when “dead ripe.” During the last season (1864), our pupil, F. Witts, Esq., collected bunches of corn from a crop of fine white oats at the under-mentioned dates. From these we counted 500 seeds, and took their weights; and, though we confess that many such experiments will be required to settle the whole facts of the case, yet the results given in table 6 are so curious, that we hope in future to direct our pupils in carrying out many similar experiments. The two samples, each of the 20th and 21st, were probably obtained from different parts of the same field, yet they lead us to conclude, as do those of the other dates, that a single day, if a hot summer, makes a great deal of difference. Now, the crop was not cut until a week after the 21st, and yet we are persuaded that we should have gained by cutting on the 20th rather than later, and, at least, we should have prevented much loss from “shed” seeds. 6. TABLE OF RIPENING OF OATS. +-------+------+-------+--------------------------------+ | | No. |Weight | | | Date. | of | in | Remarks. | | |seeds.|grains.| | +-------+------+-------+--------------------------------+ |July 9| 500 | 110 |}The interiors of the grains | |July 9| 500 | 120 |}only milky. | |July 11| 500 | 165 | }The interiors just beginning | |July 14| 500 | 165 | }to harden. | |July 16| 500 | 207·5 |}Seeds ripe, but not beginning | |July 18| 500 | 230 |}to shed. | |July 20| 500 | 250 | } | |July 20| 500 | 262·5 | }Ripe, and shedding more | |July 21| 500 | 257·5 | }every day. | |July 21| 500 | 267·5 | } | |Dec. 15| 500 | 250 |{Thrashed on the named date. | | | | |{Weight, 47½ lb. per bushel. | +-------+------+-------+--------------------------------+ [Illustration: Cratægus oxyacanthoides. Glabrous White-thorn.] HOW TO GROW GOOD FENCES. CHAPTER XXXII. ON THE NATURE OF FENCES. Fences, as boundary lines to estates and as a means of dividing and separating land into convenient parts or fields, are worthy of greater attention than we think is paid to them either by the landlord or the tenant.