SECRETARY'S REPORT. 255 



it is scarcely possible to decide to which of these two sciences they 

 oug'ht strictly to belong'. And it is just herein tliat their great diflS- 

 culty consists, for there is nothing more certain tlian tliat those 

 questions which lie, so to speak, on the confines of two sciences, 

 require for their successful invcstig-ation a high degree of develop- 

 ment of both the sciences on which they depend. Now, chemistry 

 is still far from having attained all that developement of which it is 

 capable, as the time during which it has been cultivated has not 

 been sufficiently long to admit of much progress, except in special 

 departments. Few of tliose who are not themselves chemists, are 

 aware that the facts and doctrines of modern chemistry have been 

 determined dui'ing the last sixty or seventy years ; and that, with 

 few exceptions, all the laborious investigations of the older chemists, 

 and, without exception, all their general doctrines, were then swept 

 away, to be replaced by the science as it now exists ; while organic 

 chemistry, with which agriculture is more intimately connected, 

 has been successfully prosecuted for not more than half that period. 

 To expect any rapid advances, in the practical applications of agri- 

 culture, of chemistry in its present state, is manifestly unreasonable. 

 The progress must necessarily be slow, in some instances almost 

 imperceptible ; and much must be done which at first sight the 

 practical agi'iculturist maybe inclined to consider altogether foreign 

 to his object. Extended researches will frequently be requisite 

 which do not directly lead to practical results — that is to say, which 

 are not immediately convertible into an equivalent of current coin, 

 but which are the foundation of such results, and form the starting 

 point of perhaps a very different series of experiments, having an 

 immediate bearing upon practice. It is of great importance that 

 this should be distinctly understood and borne in mind ; for it is by 

 no means uncommon to suppose that nothing more is necessary 

 than at once to convert scientific facts to practical purposes ; while, 

 so far from this being the case, the agricultural chemist has a two- 

 fold duty to perform — he must both determine the scientific facts of 

 agz'iculture, and eliminate from them the practical conclusions to 

 which they lead. It may, pcrliaps, be said that the establishment 

 of these facts falls within the province of the pure chemist, and that 

 their practical application only ought to be the province of the 

 agricultural chemist. But if this principle were to be acted upon, 

 the progress of chemical agriculture would be slow indeed ; for the 

 investigations of the pure chemist lead him now, and are likely for 

 a long period to lead him, in directions very remote from those most 

 likely to afford the materials which the agricultural chemist requires 

 to work upon. The latter would, therefore, require to sit idly 

 waiting till the former supplied him with facts, which his own exer- 

 tions would have enabled him to ascertain. Nay, the agricultural 

 cnemist may even do a better service to agriculture, by pursuing 

 the investigation of those apparently theoretical subjects, than by 

 directing himself to those which seem to have the most immediate 

 practical bearings. 



There is another point on which there has been a good deal of 

 misunderstanding between the chemist and the agriculturist, which 



