IMPROVEMENT OF SOIDS. 27 



o 



moting vegetable growth, and it also renders the soil more compe- 

 tent for accumulating a store which will maintain the fertility of 

 the land ; and thus we have in the use of lime as a manure a valu- 

 able means of realizing the first requirement, an increased absorb- 

 ing power. The attention may now, however, be advantageously 

 directed to the facilities for the increase of these powers, and these 

 are manifestly two-fold, namely,, the exposure of the soil fully to 

 the air, and the passage of rain through the land. The tillage of 

 the land is, therefore, just the agency required to accomplish the 

 desirable result, for as I have said before, the inversion, stirring 

 and crushing of the soil by the various operations of ploughing, 

 cultivating, harrowing and rolling, each and all promote the ex- 

 posure of fresh portions of the soil for atmospheric action ; and 

 whatever capability is possessed for the secretion of ammonia, the 

 soil is thus furnished with the opportunity for its exercise. 



" If you view our field labor as so many means for exposing every 

 portion of the surface soil to the air, you will at once realize the 

 value of many operations which we have hitherto only considered 

 as of mechanical value in preparing the land for seed, by rendering 

 it light, and giving the roots freedom for growth and extension. 

 But the advantages are double ; for not only is it necessary for the 

 luxuriant growth of a crop that it should be so placed that its roots 

 have a freedom of action for searching after the food which the 

 crop requires, but as I have already explained, the means we adopt 

 for attaining this result equally facilitates the success of the crop 

 by the accumulation of fertilizing matter which is being simultan- 

 eously made. This free and loose condition of the soil is equally 

 favorable for the passage of rain into the soil; an 1 wlien this is 

 propei'ly assisted by an efficient under-drainage, then alone is the 

 full advantage derived from the rain and its fertilizing contents. 



" With a knowledge of these principles, if you review that old es- 

 tablished practice of fallowing, you will not fail to detect the rea- 

 son for past success in this practice, and you will see another in- 

 stance of that true union which exists between practice and science, 

 which every lover of agricultural progress hails with feelings of 

 pleasure. The true principle of fallowing has been to expose the 

 land to the wind, rain, frost and heat, and to keep the land moving 

 as much as possible. Manifest have been the advantages derived 

 from extra ploughing, which to the eye appeared at the time pro- 

 ductive of little change or benefit, but the succeeding crop has in 

 18 



