It is a matter of common observation that no family of flowering plants includes so great a number of individuals as the Gramineae—a fact which seems in part accounted for by their extraordinarily prolific and effective seeding. There are a number of detailed records confirming this general impression. As long ago as 1660, Sir Kenelm Digby related that the “Fathers of the Christian Doctrine at Paris doe still keep by them for a Monument (and indeed it is an admirable one) a Plant of Barley consisting of 249. stalkes, Springing from one Root or Grain of Barley, in which they counted above 18000. Grains or seeds of Barley”. Later in the seventeenth century, Thomas Everard recorded that from one grain of Wheat he had obtained eighty ears and above 4000 grains. Seeding on this scale may lead to a rapidity of increase which seems almost miraculous. A few years ago the chief kind of Wheat grown in Canada was that known as ‘Marquis’. One grain of Marquis was planted in an experimental plot at Ottawa in the spring of 1903, and in 1918, from the progeny of this grain after fifteen years, 300,000,000 bushels of Wheat were produced in Canada and the United States.

In the grasses there is normally a period of seed-rest before germination. The whole subject of seed-rest, and the related problem of delayed germination, seem to need a thorough comparative study, for our present knowledge of these questions is only complete enough to reveal much obscurity.