Oats will thrive in almost any soil, but they are chiefly productive on land that has been newly broken up. They are usually sown in February or March, and the harvest commences about August. Several kinds or varieties are cultivated in different parts of England, such as _white oats_, _black oats_, _brown_ or _red oats_, _Tartarian_ or _reed oats_, _Friezeland oats_, _Poland oats_, and some others, but, of these, the first are considered the most valuable. 29. _WHEAT is a well known kind of corn_ (Triticum hybernum, Fig. 13) _which is cultivated in most of the civilized countries of the world, and is supposed to have been originally introduced into Europe, from some part of Asia._ No grain is so valuable to the inhabitants of nearly all climates as this; and, by a wonderful ordination of Providence, it is rendered capable of sustaining, without injury, almost the two extremes of heat and cold. Not only does it ripen in Egypt and Barbary, but it ripens equally well in Scotland, Denmark, and Sweden. It constitutes the chief food of the British nation; and its abundance or scarcity regulates, in a great degree, the welfare and prosperity of the inhabitants. The whole annual consumption of grain, in this island, amounts to nearly 25,000,000 quarters; and in London alone, to more than 1,162,100 quarters. Of this by far the greatest proportion is wheat. For the cultivation of this important grain the best lands are rich clays and heavy loam; and, although light soils will produce wheat of excellent quality, yet the crops on the other soils are by far the most abundant. The best season for committing the seed to the ground is September, and the earlier in the month the better. Some farmers consider it necessary to steep the seed in brine or other pickle before it is used, to prevent it from being devoured by vermin, and render the corn less liable to disease than it would be without this process. In a good season the wheat harvest commences in August, and is finished in the course of the ensuing month. This species of corn is usually cut with instruments called reaping-hooks, but in some parts it is mown with scythes. The different kinds or varieties of wheat that are cultivated in this country are too numerous to be particularized. Wheat is liable to injury, not only from the attack of insects, but from several kinds of disease, the principal of which are _blight_, _mildew_, and _smut_. In the former the fibres and leaves of the plants are contracted and enfeebled, and the grain is ultimately deprived of sufficient nourishment: by mildew the straw and ear are affected: and by smut the grains, instead of containing their proper substance, become filled with a black or dark brown powder. _Wheat flour_ consists of four distinct principles, gluten, starch, albumen, and a sweet kind of mucilage. And it is a remarkable circumstance, that the _gluten_, if not similar, has a very near alliance to animal substances.