328 University of California Publications ni Agricultural Sciences [Vol. 1 



bodies formed by virtue of this interchange of ions. The soluble 

 products, including the salts of calcium, magnesium or other 

 bases, which are formed when salt solutions are allowed to act 

 upon soils, must be considered, if a true conception of the physi- 

 cal effects of the added salts is to be secured. In addition, the 

 individual properties of the new silicate complex, which is 

 formed simultaneously with the exchange of ions, must be recog- 

 nized as bearing significantly on the final effects of the added 

 salt on the physical condition of the soil. Undoubtedly, these 

 factors have a bearing on the effects of salts on the capillary 

 movement of water in soils, and make impossible the direct appli- 

 cation of physical laws concerning surface tension and densities 

 to the phenomena of capillary rise, as Briggs and Lapham^* have 

 attempted. Instead, the factors discussed above may help to 

 harmonize the observations made by these investigators with the 

 more recent findings of Kossovich.^'' 



The addition to soils of KCl, NH.Cl, NaNO., Na.SO, or NaCl, 

 and in fact most neutral salts, has been shown by Way,'*° Eich- 

 horn,*^ Henneberg and Stohman,*- Peters,*^ Van Beramelen,** 

 Bradley,^^ Curry and Smith,*" and others, to result in increasing 

 the quantity of calcium, magnesium and other metallic ions in the 

 solution secured from soils so treated, as compared with the same 

 soils receiving distilled water. Furthermore it has been shown 

 by Hall and Morison,*' Davis,'** Patten and Gallagher,*^ IMasoni,^'*^ 

 and others that calcium and magnesium salts possess more pro- 

 nounced flocculating powers than the corresponding salts of the 

 alkali metals. This fact mav account for the diff'erent rates at 



1912. 



38 U. S. Dept. Agric, Bur. of Soils, Bull. 19, 1902. 



39 Cited from Exp. Sta. Rec, vol. 2.5, no. 9, p. 824. 

 *o Loc. cit. 



41 Cited from Sullivan, loc. cit., p. 12. 



42 Cited from Sullivan, loc. cit., p. 13. 

 43Landw. Vers. Stat., vol. 2, p. 113, 1860. 



44 Loc. cit. 



45 Oregon Agric. Exper. Sta., Bull. 112, 1912. 



4fi New Hampshire -Vgrie. Exper. Sta., Bull. 170, 1914. 



47 Loc. cit. 



48 IT. S. Dept. Agric, Bur. of Soils, Bull. 82. 



49 U. S. Dept. Agric., Bur. of Soils, Bull. 52, 1908. 



•''O Abstract in Journ. Chem. Soc. London, vol. 102, no. 597, p. 677, 



