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tarmer in the Queen's County, in Ireland. As this man is a very intel- ligent perſon, and particularly as he worked under his father in the farming bufinefs the earlier part of his life, it appears to me that his information is worthy of communication.

— He told me, in the phraſe of his country, that potatoes,“ whether on their parent-bed, or in the pit in which they are preſerved, after being ans up, by being uncovered, take the wind, and become unwholeſome for foo to man, as they cauſe ſickneſs, and greatly diſorder the body.“ He told me, at the ſame time, that his father, after picking out the largeſt of theſe potatoes, from the ſurface of the field or the mouth of the pit, for ſeed(for which they were as ſerviceable as any other) gave always the refuſe to the pigs, and that, to them, they were not an unwholeſome food.

The fact of their being unwholeſome to man ſhould be enquired into moſt certainly in the firſt place, at a time when, on account of the ſcarcity of bread, the poor are glad of any offal they can get at; and when, what they will think good food, is likely to preſent itſelf to them by the ſide of every footpath. Probably ſome hundred thouſands of people in England will this year, for the firſt time, be familiarized with potatoes; and many of the farmers who cultivate them, know as little about them as their hinds. 1 wiſh, therofore, moſt ardently that the Board of Agriculture would proſecute this enquiry without loſs of time; that, if it ſhould be thought neceſſary, there may be inſerted in the paper promiſed by them for general circulation, a caution with reſpect to roots of my deſcription, viz.°%Roots lying on, or immediately under the furface of the ground, of a different colour from thoſe in the ſame plantation, which lie at a greater depth.“

Should it turn out, as IJ am ſatisfied it will, that theſe roots are unwhole- ſome to man, and yet that they may be given to ſome ſorts of cattle with- out danger, the farmer will not be diſcouraged by this caution: and ſhould it be proved that the roots of this deſcription are as proper as any other for ſeed, there will be added much to the maſs of food for the conſumer, as almoſt all the wholeſome produce of the crop may then be ſpared for the exigencies of the time, without depriving the grower of the means of having a crop of the ſame ſort of potatoe the following year, ſhould he have found that of this year beneficial. It appears to me, that the moſt ignorant grower of potatoes may give material information to the Board upon ſome of theſe points. For example, the owners of the great plantations of po- tatoes on the Effex road, a few miles from town, may be aſked, What they do with potatoes of that deſcription? The ſame queſtion may be

aſked of different potatoe-growers in Lancafſhire. I have worked myſelf up to he really alarmed at the proſpect of danger from this cauſe, if not