32 BOARD OF AQRICULTURE. 



were such men as Liebig, BoSvsinganlt, Yille and Way, on the 

 other such as Lawes and Gilbert, and Vulcker, and finally it was 

 found tliat both were right and both were wrong, ino plant can 

 be brought to perfection without nitrogen, no plant can be 

 brought to perfection without its ash constituents, both are abso- 

 lutely indispensable. 



Again the theory was advocated that if the farmer would know 

 what was needed for the nutrition of plants, it was necessary 

 that the soil should pass under the eye of the chemist and be 

 analj'zed, that he might know its wanting elements and have 

 them supplied. But it was soon discovered that the chemist with 

 his strong acids could wring lime out of a soil when the plant, 

 that nicer chemist, would etarve to death because it was unable 

 to obtain lime from a soil tliat contained it in abundance. Thus 

 when the method of analyzing the soil was tested it was found 

 that it could not be made available in agriculture, and there 

 are hardl}' any two specimens of soil from the same field that 

 would show the same anal} sis, and thus chemical analysis for this 

 purpose was discarded. 



Thus for forty years the opinions of scientists have been in a 

 transition state in relation to the subject matter of plant nutrition. 

 Theories have been advocated only to be disproved b}' the dis- 

 coverj' of new facts. Step by step scientific men have advanced, 

 until to-day 1 think we can say with truth that scientific men are 

 practically in accord as to the principles of plant nutrition Prac- 

 tically we agree that the scientit-ts know what they affirm when 

 they say they know what are the requisites for the food of plants. 

 It may not be time thrown away if we state what these princ^iples 

 are, and what the principles of practical men as shown by their 

 practice. 



In Ihe first place we say that the plant which to us practical 

 fellows is a profound mystery, a sealed book, is perfectly open 

 and plain to the eye of the scientific man, because he has read it 

 through and through beneath the microscope. Now pardon me 

 while I say that while I cannot endorse all that has been said in 

 regard to the ignorance of the farmer, I may be treading in the 

 same path when I say that the farmer when he drops a seed in 

 the soil knows little of the result which is to follow in the growth 

 of the plant. Topsy " supposed she growed," and that is about 

 the beginning and endi?ig of many a practical man's knowledge 

 in relation to that most wonderful structure the siniplest seed or 



