Experiments were made on the growth of barley after turnips, and also in an ordinary four-course rotation. After growing turnips ten years consecutively with purely cinerial manures, and carting off the produce, the yield of barley was much smaller than in the experimental field, where barley was grown after barley. The turnips, though very small crops, had exhausted the soil of nitrogen to a greater extent than corn crops would have done. On one plot where rape cake had been applied to the turnips, the produce of barley was 81⁄4 bushels more than when none had been used. In the rotation experiments barley was grown after turnips (carted off), and was followed by beans and wheat. In one series all the crops were unmanured; in another the turnips received superphosphate; in a third the turnips received an abundant cinerial and nitrogenous manure.
The mean produce of the six crops of barley obtained in twenty-four years of rotation was as follows:
| Character of Rotation. | Dressed Corn. | Straw and Chaff. |
| bushels. | cwt. | |
| Unmanured continuously | 383⁄8 | 213⁄4 |
| Superphosphate for turnips only | 293⁄8 | 161⁄2 |
| Mixed manure for turnips only | 443⁄8 | 251⁄4 |
| Mean produce of unmanured barley in barley field during the same season | 211⁄2 | 121⁄8 |
The unmanured turnips were so very small in quantity, that the barley in the first series was practically grown after a fallow; this barley, however, was a much larger crop than that grown after turnips manured with superphosphate only, the available nitrogen of the soil in this case being exhausted by the turnips.
In the last series the residue of the abundant manure applied to the turnip crop suffices to produce a good crop of barley.
Qual., Uses, &c. Its employment and value as food, and in the manufacture of malt, are well known. It forms good wholesome bread well adapted for persons who live luxuriously; but which, for the abstemious and the delicate, is inferior to that made of wheat, as it is rather less nutritious, and less easy of digestion, and commonly proves laxative to those unaccustomed to its use. Barley-flour and barley-meal are also more perishable than wheat-flour; being very apt to acquire a hot nauseous taste, which even the heat of the oven does not remove. In a medical point of view, barley is regarded as the mildest and least irritating of the cereals. It has always been in high estimation as a demulcent and emollient. The decoction (BAR′LEY-WATER), made with pearl barley, is a common and useful drink in inflammatory diseases, particularly in those of the chest and urinary organs. Among the Ancients, decoctions of barley (κραθη) were the principal aliments and medicines employed in acute diseases.
Barley was extensively cultivated by the Romans and many other nations of antiquity, as well as by the ancient inhabitants of Gaul. The Greeks are said to have trained their athletes on it.
The best tests of the genuineness of barley are its colour, freedom from dust, grit, and insects. The microscope will lead to the detection of any cheaper grains if mixed with it. It is rarely adulterated, although it is said to be extensively used for the purpose of sophisticating wheat, annatto, and roll liquorice.
Barley Starch.