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Patea Mail, 19 April 1881, Page 4

Oultivatiox of WHEAT. —Isis was supposed to liave introduced wheat into Egypt, Demeter into Greece, and the Emperor Chin Wong into China, about :>,OOO n.c. In Europe it was cultivated before the period of history, as samples have been recovered from the lacustrine dwelling of Switzerland. In England it was probably not cultivated by the ancient Britons, but Anglo-Saxons when Bede wrote, early in the eighth century, sowed their wheat in the spring, and in the days of Queen Elizabeth its cultivation was but partial. Indeed, wheat was an article of comparative luxury till nearly the seventeenth century. In India wheat seems not to be native, but introduced, for its Sanerit name signifies " food of the barbarian yet three varieties are mentioned in the Bhavaprakasa, one of which, a large grained, is said to have come from the west, and another, a small-grained or beardless wheat, is said to have been indigenous to Middle India,

Since the beginning of the 16th century more than 800,000 acres been won from the water in Holland, and reclamation still goes on the rate of about eight acres a-day. Sir W. Lawson, M.P., in his speech at Cloator Moor, said that Lord Beaconsficld’s new novel contained '• the greatest trash that anybody ever published.”