is to mix with the grain the joints of the straw which are cut during
the process of threshing and separated when winnowing. These are often
sprayed with water in order to increase both bulk and weight. The
moisture is absorbed by the grain, which thereby swells and is made to
look bigger.

Under the Seed Corn Law of 1898 the Government make advances of seed
wheat, barley, oats and vetches to cultivators under an agreement to
repay in kind after harvest a quantity of grain equivalent to the amount
of seed so advanced, together with an addition of one-fourth of the
quantity so advanced, by way of interest.

This benefit is very generally availed of by smaller cultivators. It has
not, however, been found possible for Government to keep separately the
various kinds and qualities of tithe corn, from which these advances are
made, and farmers frequently complain that the seed, so issued
promiscuously, is unsuitable to the land, aspect, or special conditions
on individual farms. Weevilled grain also is a source of trouble, and
farmers obtaining such seed advances must be prepared to run risk of
failure from this cause.

It is a well-known fact that cultivators often sell their seed corn so
advanced them, in order to buy some other corn known to them as more
suited to their land, and they are often justified, perhaps, in so
doing.

The issues are made by District Commissioners to selected applicants who
are believed to be unable to buy seed for cash. The average annual
issues, for the last five years, have been: wheat, 38,013 kiles; barley,
31,479 kiles.

_Wheat_

In ancient times, when the population numbered about 1,100,000, the
Island was said to be self-supporting in the matter of wheat. Taking the
annual consumption of wheat per head of population at 8 bushels
(Gennadius's _Report on the Agriculture of Cyprus_, Part I, p. 8) and
after making an allowance for seed, the annual production would then
have been about 10,000,000 bushels. From British Consular Reports it
appears that in 1863 the average produce was reckoned at 640,000
bushels. The average annual production of wheat for the ten years ended
1913, as shown in Blue Book Returns, was 2,292,827 kiles. For later
years the figures are:

Year. Kiles.

1914 1,924,336
1915 1,761,501
1916 1,524,484
1917 1,782,800
1918 2,424,570

Wheat is sown at the rate of 1 kile per don