No. 7. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 413 



MR. WING: 1 would like to ask a question. I would like to know 

 whether the crushed limestone will reallj' destroy plants from the 

 soil? 



DR. FREAR: I find that it will practically destroy the humus. 



MR. WING: I had an idea t"Bat it would not. 



BR. FREAR: It does so more slowly, and therefore on soils of 

 slow growth, or on light soils, the carbonate of lime should be 

 used. When the limestone is air-soaked it loses a large part of its 

 causticity and m a slight application of six, eight or ten bushels the 

 danger is very much less. 



A Member: We have in our country what is known as a carbonate 

 of lime and also what is known as magnesia of lime. Does the mag- 

 nesia affect the soil in the same way? 



DR. FREAR: I have given some attention to this, and I believe 

 that if the magnesia of lime is present in very great quantities it 

 might do so, but from what I have gathered from the use of magnesia 

 of limestone throughout the State the danger is very slight, but the 

 magnesia is found only in limited portions of the State. 



MR. WING : In my part of Ohio you will find a great deal of this 

 magnesia of limestone. The glacial action ground up the limestone 

 and if you dig down under the ground six inches you will find a great 

 many pebbles of magnesia limestone, some of them as large as hen's 

 eggs. 



At this point the discussion was broken off by the entrance of the 

 Hon. Edwin S. Stuart, Governor of Pennsylvania, who, upon being 

 presented by the Secretary, spoke as follows: 



ADDRESS OF GOVERNOR STUART. 



'Mr. Chairman and Members of the State Board of Agriculture: I 

 have been a very busy man since I came to Harrisburg, and conse- 

 quently have not had time to make any preparation for my talk to 

 the Board today; but I desire to assure you that there is no body of 

 citizens in this Slate for whom I would be willing to do more to ad- 

 vance their interests than for the farmers of the State of Pennsyl- 

 vania. (Applause.) I understand from some statements over which 

 I glanced today that the farm products of Pennsylvania are greater 

 than almost any other State in the Union. That alone would make 

 any citizen proud of the State, and I assure you that you are not 

 more so than 1 am. I cannot, perhaps, talk to you with as great 

 knowledge of farming as some of my predecessors, but any man who 

 has been Governor of Pennsylvania understands the value of the 

 work done by farmers, not only as farmers, but as citizens. In all 

 my knowledge of the people of Pennsylvania there has been no more 



