23Q CHEMICO- AGRICULTURAL TOUR. 



striking and instructive manner ; and I trust that ere long the 

 Eoyal Dublin Society may have a similar collection in their agri- 

 cultural museum, and with this view I have already commenced 

 making such a collection. Proceeding by Folkestone and Boulogne 

 I went by the latter direct by rail to Paris. This line of railway 

 passes through a rather flat part of the country, which, though it 

 here and there offers much that is picturesque, still presents along 

 the line no very striking or grand scenery. The agriculture and 

 agricultural productions of this part of France appear on the 

 whole, to bear a close resemblance to that of the south of England, 

 save that there is not so much land under pasture, and beet-root 

 is there very extensively grown for the manufacture of sugar. 



Arriving in Paris, I called on Baron Dumas, MM. Pelouze, Pele- 

 got, and other distinguished scientific gentlemen to whom I had 

 letters of introduction, and from whom I hoped to gain some infor- 

 mation relative to the object of my tour. Baron Dumas, whom I was 

 most anxious to meet, as he was one of the ministers of the agri- 

 culture of France, was, unfortunately, absent from Paris at the 

 time of my visit; but from those gentlemen with whom I had an 

 interview I obtained some information as to the objects of interest 

 in Paris connected with my department of science, and during my 

 very short stay there I visited several of the principal scientific in- 

 stitutions and chemical laboratories of that city. At the Jardin des 

 Plantes, amongst objects of interest in that great national collec- 

 tion of iS atural History in its various departments, I was much 

 struck with the mode in which the plants are arranged in the bo- 

 tanic garden ; for there the visitor may at once know the nature of 

 the various plants growing there by the colors of the labels attach- 

 ed to each ; thus red denotes medicinal, green alimentary, blue 

 those used in the arts, yellow ornamental, and black poisonous ; 

 and the various plants, according to the uses to which they are 

 applied, have one or more of those colored labels, bearing the gen- 

 eric, specific, and common designation attached to each, wliich is, 

 I conceive, a very useful and instructive mode of arrangement. 



From Paris I proceeded by the Eastern railway to Meaux, a 

 small and ancient town situated on the river Marne, about 28 miles 

 to the east of that city, where I stopped a day, and had an oppor- 

 tunity of seeing how they cultivate their different crops in that part 

 of France. Great attention here appears to be paid to irrigation, 

 and I was very much struck with the number of wells which are to 



