SECRETARY'S REPORT. 113 



doubt, converted in the stomach of animals into gum and sugar, 

 and applied in the system to feed the respiration, or for the 

 laying on of fat. Mangolds are almost as nutritious as carrots 

 for fattening animals. Mangolds should not be given to ewes 

 when in lamb, nor fed to horses when carrots can be had. 

 Roots of any kind, when fed to stock (especially horses) in a 

 very cold, frosty state, will have a tendency to gripe, and almost 

 certainly scour the bowels. 



The yield of the root crop will be invariably foretold in the 

 quantity of manure applied, and the manner of cultivating the 

 crop. The roots spoken of in this Report have all been brought 

 from a wild state to their present condition. If placed by the 

 farmer in an uncongenial soil, the plant must be fed with the 

 food necessary to nourish it into growth. If not properly 

 manured and properly cultivated, the crop fails, and the climate 

 is blamed in consequence. 



Preserving Roots. — Chaptal's Chemistry applied to agricul- 

 ture, chapter on the preservation of animal and vegetable sub- 

 stances, remarks as follows : The nature of all bodies which 

 have ceased to live or vegetate, is changed as soon as the 

 physical or chemical laws by which they were governed cease 

 to act. The elements of which they were composed then form 

 new combinations, and consequently new substances. While 

 an animal lives or a plant vegetates, the laws of chemical 

 affinity are continually modified in its organs by the laws 

 of vitality ; but when the animal or plant ceases to live, it 

 becomes entirely subject to the laws of chemical affinity, by 

 which alone its decomposition is effected. The principles of 

 the atmospheric air which is^ imbibed by the organs of living 

 bodies, whether animal or vegetable, are decomposed and 

 assimilated by them, while dead bodies are decomposed by its 

 action. Heat is the most powerful stimulant to the vital 

 functions ; yet it becomes, after death, one of the most active 

 agents in the work of destruction. Our efforts, then, for the 

 preservation of root crops ought to be directed to counteracting 

 or governing those chemical or physical agents from the action 

 of which they suffer. All the methods which have been suc- 

 cessful, have been formed upon this principle. The chemical 

 agents which exert the most powerful influence over the pro- 



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