191 



farmer in cultivating crops therein. Earth containing no mould, or combustible 

 matter, is not of itself soil, any more than animal or vegetable substances alone 

 make soil. How important it is, then, that the farmer should know enough of 

 the chemical properties of the surface of the earth he operates in, to enable him 

 to cultivate in each field that crop for which its soil is best adapted — or rightly 

 to temper his soil, so as to eftect a judicious combination of those constituents 

 most congenial to the product he may desire to reap from it. 



Racine Soil, adapted to Wheat. — I have made these suggestions with a 

 view of illustrating my opinion, that Racine County is a good wheat-producing 

 district; and that the failure of our farmers, for three or four years past, to raise 

 good crops of that grain, is attributable more to a lack of knowledge of the che- 

 mical properties of their soil, and to the absence of a judicious system of alter- 

 nation of crops and sub-soiling, than to any inherent defect of the soil itself. 



An eminent Scotch chemist, Dr. Anderson, made critical analyses of several 

 wheat soils in Scotland in 1850; among which, samples of surface soil from 

 Midlothian gave 6.789-1 OOOths of combustible matter, or mould. Its compo- 

 sition was as follows: Carbon, 4.500 — hydrogen, 0.215 — oxygen, 1.806 — 

 ammonia, 0.268 ; making 6.789. This soil was distinguished for its produc- 

 tiveness in wheat. Now it is worthy of note, that that powerful fertilizer, Peruvian 

 guano, contains 6.500 of organic animal matter, almost precisely the propor- 

 tion that is found in the Scotch wheat soil above described. 



The celebrated German chemist, author and agriculturist, Von Tha?r, says the 

 richest soil he ever analyzed, was composed of 



19^ parts in a hundred of humus, (or combustible matter ;) 



70 of clay ; 



7i of silicious sand ; 



3 of lime. 



100 



The fattest soil, however, is not best adapted to wheat; but according to the 

 testimony of the most intelligent farmers, a first rate wheat soil ought to contain 

 only about six or seven parts in a hundred of humus (or mould) — which it seems, 

 is just the proportion of that constituent in the subsoil of Racine County, as ana- 

 lyzed by Dr. Philo R. Hoy, of this city. The Doctor, by the way, has done good 

 een'ice to science by the inve.stigations he has made in the ornithology, zoology, 

 botany, horticulture, agriculture, &c., of the county ; and who may be expected, 

 1 understand, at no remote period, to favor the public with his scientific 

 researches. 



Analysis of Racine County Soil. — The following is what Dr. Hoy calls 

 his " rough and simple" analysis of the soil of Racine county, but the correctness 



