402 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



It would be very joyful news to our farmers in Great 

 Britain, if I could assure them that wheat requires only 

 " from one-half to full quantity of all the nitrogen " contained 

 in the crop to be applied in manure, or, in other words, that 

 by the application, at the most, of one pound of nitrogen in 

 manure, a p.ound could be recovered in the produce. So far, 

 however, from my being able to accept this statement, I feel 

 no hesitation in saying that whatever may be the nature of 

 the "recent experiments and past experience " to which Mr. 

 Stewart refers, if they assert, as a general agricultural fact, 

 that the application of half a pound to a pound of nitrogen 

 in manure will produce one pound of nitrogen in a crop of 

 wheat, or that a quarter of a pound of nitrogen in manure 

 will produce one pound of it in corn, they are based upon 

 error. The only manner in which such a result might pos- 

 sibly be arrived at would be by the continuous growth of 

 wheat or corn by means (1) of a mineral manure alone, and 

 (2) by the same manure combined with salts of ammonia, 

 if this were done with very great care, and for a sufficiently 

 long period ; although I should even then expect more than 

 a pound of nitrogen would be required to produce one pound 

 of that substance in increased growth, and that more nitro- 

 gen would be recovered by the corn than by the wheat. 



Mr. Stewart says, further, that Charles V. Mapes is op- 

 posed to my idea that corn should be placed in the list of 

 grain-crops which require to be supplied with a surplus of 

 nitrogen, but has insisted that it should be classed with 

 clover and the leguminous crops, which yield larger quanti- 

 ties of nitrogen in their product, but require a very incon- 

 siderable supply. 



The statement that corn yields large quantities of nitrogen, 

 like the leguminous crops, is somewhat inconsistent with the 

 table given by Mr. Stewart on page 46 of the report, which 

 shows that corn contains, not only less nitrogen than the 

 leguminous crops, but even less nitrogen than wheat. My 

 object, however, is not to find fault with Mr. Stewart's 

 statements, but to endeavor to correct what I consider to be 

 erroneous in them. 



First, then, with regard to corn. That it is a gramina- 

 ceous plant, and possesses all the properties of that order, I 

 have not a shadow of doubt. All the plants containing large 



