Leadership of the Patent Office


to some 31,000 subscribers to his magazine. Judd obtained his
seed from Vilmorin in time to grow a 75-foot row in 1856. Two
years later, Judd distributed 34,500 one-pound packages of the
seed. (6) This work helped to extend cultivation of the cane to
every portion of the country.

 PROMOTION OF SORGHUMS
 Five acres of land-the beginning of the Federal propagating
 garden-were set aside in Washington, D.C., for the production of
 cane seed. The first seed crop from this land was distributed during
 1856-57. After this time the Patent Office did not make any more
 general distributions of cane seed because enough seed had already
 been given out to make them generally available. Subsequent dis-
 tributions were mainly of special varieties, or else made for the
 sake of giving something free to the voters.
 Value of Sorgos-Commissioner Mason actively promoted the
 Chinese sugar cane because he was enthusiastic over its many
 uses. It could be employed in the manufacture of sugar, syrup,
 alcohol, or beer. From the cane came a dye to make wool or silk
 a permanent red or pink. Livestock ate it avidly, either dry or
 green. The rapid growth and the amount of nutritious fodder
 produced by this cane could not be matched by any other crop
 grown on an equal space. It would also support large numbers of
 livestock for the production of beef, milk, and fertilizer. Interest
 in the Chinese sugar cane reached a peak in 1857. The possibility
 of its extensive cultivation-up to 25 million acres-as a partial
 substitute for Indian corn was foreseen.
 D. J. Browne, in promoting the crop at a meeting of the United
State Agricultural Society, saw its chief value as cattle fodder and
prophesied that it would be revolutionary in this respect. Such
promotion probably was necessary to counteract the skepticism
of farmers who remembered the Morus multicaulis speculation.
Its merits for certain uses were already well established, and a
chemist worked for the Patent Office to determine the amount of
alcohol and saccharine matter in the cane stalk. Experiments in
sugar manufacture were already under way in Texas and other
states.
 The first recorded instance of the sorghum's recognition as
drouth resistant is that of a farmer at Gonzales, Texas, who found
it ".. .an important acquisition to our agricultural resources. It
stands drouth better than any other plant that I am acquainted