_Of Change of_ INDIVIDUALS.
Seeds, in their natural Climate, do not degenerate, unless Culture has
improved them; and then, upon Omission of that Culture, they return to
their first natural State.
As the Benefit of changing of Species of Seeds is from Difference of
Tillage, so the Benefit of changing Individuals of the same Species
appears to be from those Causes which are, generally, themselves, the
Effects of different Climates, such as Heat and Moisture, which may
also vary very much in the same Latitude and Neighbourhood; as the
same Mountain in the Country of the _Mogul_ (related by Mr. _Evelyn_,
from Monsieur _Bernier_), on the South Side produces _Indian_ Plants,
and on the North Side _European_ Plants, from different Exposures; and
some Land, retaining Water longer, is colder; some, suffering it to
pass down quicker, and by the Nature and Figure of its Parts, causes
such a Refraction and Reflexion of the Sun’s Rays, which give a great
Warmth, as in Sand, and gravelly Grounds, that are well situate, and
have an under Stratum of some Sort of hollow Matter, next under the
Staple[215], or upper Stratum, wherein the Plough is exercised.
[215] This hollow Matter lets the Water pass down the sooner from
the Surface, whereby the Staple or the Ground becomes the drier, and
consequently warmer.
This beneficial Change of Individuals seems rather to be from the
forementioned Causes, than from Change of Food; and these Causes shew
their Efficacy, chiefly in the Generation or Fœtation of those Seeds;
as Flax-seed brought from _Holland_, and sown here, will bring as fine
Flax as there; but the very next Generation of it coarser, and so
degenerating gradually, after Two or Three Descents, becomes no better
than the common ordinary Sort; yet its Food is the same, when the Flax
is fine, as when ’tis coarse.
And so it is, when Individuals of Wheat are changed: So Silk-worms,
hatched and bred in _France_, of Eggs or Seed brought from _Italy_,
will make as fine Silk as the _Italian_; but the Eggs of these laid in
_France_ and their Issue, will make no better Silk than the _French_;
though their Food be from Leaves of the same Mulberry-trees, when they
make fine Silk and coarse: Therefore ’tis from the Climate, where the
Eggs are impregnated, not where they have their Incubation or Food,
when hatched, and fed to their Lives End, that this Difference happens.
Common Barley, sown once in the burning Sand at _Patney_ in
_Wiltshire_, will, for many Years after, if sown on indifferent warm
Ground, be ripe Two or Three Weeks sooner than any other[216], which
has never been impregnate at _Patney_: But if sown a Degree farther
North, on cold clayey Land, will, in Two or Three Years, lose this
Quality, and become as late ripe as any other.
[216] Barley is far from being improved by becoming rath-ripe; for
it loses more good Qualities than it gets by being sown at _Patney_:
’Tis so tender, that if it be sown early, the Frost is apt to kill
it; or if it be sown late in _May_, on the same Day, and in the same
Soil, with the same Sort of Barley that is not rath-ripe, it will be
much thinner bodied than the late-ripe; and besides, if it happens
to have any Check by Cold or Drought, it never recovers it as the
other doth, at what time soever it is sown. It is now, I am informed,
gone out of Fashion, and very few Farmers have sown it of late Years.
I know a little Parish, that, I believe, formerly lost about Two
hundred Pounds _per Ann._ by sowing rath-ripe Barley: But long and
dear Experience hath now convinced them of their Error, and obliged
them totally to disuse it.
Indeed _Patney_ is far from improving the Species of Barley, except we
think it improved by becoming more weak and tender, and shorter-lived;
which last-mentioned Quality fits it for such Countries, where the
Summers are too short for other Barley to ripen.
The Grains or Seeds of Vegetables are their Eggs; and the individual
Plants, immediately proceeding from them, have not only the Virtues
they received in Embryo (or rather _in plantulis_), but the Diseases
also; for when smutty Wheat is sown, unless the Year prove very
favourable, the Crop will be smutty; which is an evident Token of _mala
stamina_.
The smutty Grains will not grow; for they turn to a black Powder: But
when some of these are in a Crop, then, to be sure, many of the rest
are infected; and the Disease will shew itself in the next Generation,
or Descent of it, if the Year wherein ’tis planted prove a wet one.
Weeds, and their Seed, in the Fields where they grow naturally, for
Time immemorial, come to as great Perfection as ever, without Change of
Soil.
These Weeds, with Acorns, and other Masts, Crabs, Sloes, Hips, and
Haws, are thought to have been, originally, the only natural Product of
our Climate: Therefore other Plants being Exotics, many of them, as to
their Individuals, require Culture and Change of Soil, without which
they are liable more or less to degenerate.
But to say, that the Soil can cause Wheat to degenerate into Rye,
or convert, Rye into Wheat, is what reflects upon the Credit of
_Laurembergius_: ’Tis as easy to believe, that an Horse, by feeding in
a certain Pasture, will degenerate into a Bull, and in other Pasture
revert to an Horse again; these are scarce of more different Species
than Wheat and Rye are: If the different Soil of _Wittemberg_ and
_Thuringia_ change one Species, they may the other.