February 22, 1908 



HORTICULTURE 



229 



^^ Bread from Stones 



tf 



This is tlie sixtli in tlie series of articles upon soluble fertilizers 

 Ijy Mr. Pray. We cau supply the precediug coutributious on request. 



'I'liose who have considered the matter at all must 

 now realize how important is the influence of fineness 

 upon the speed with which even the "everlasting" rocks 

 yield up what stores of plant food they may contain. 

 The grinding to dust of rocks that has gone on for 

 geological ages is the mighty "Mill of the Gods" that 

 has stocked the rich valleys and spread our magnificent 

 deep western soils which are so rich in possibilities for 

 plant life. 



Yonder hill-crowning-forest has enormous quantities 

 of potash, phosphates, lime and magnesia. The same 

 for that apple orchard on the rocky slope. Those trees 

 have got their mineral water from those rocks. It can't 

 be denied that somehow they have got a living, per- 

 haps a precarious one, but nevertheless a living has 

 been filched from those hard-featured stones which 

 compose the hill. We can find the "goods" on them. 

 That oak leaf Iras over 10 per cent mineral makeup. 



By fine grinding we have been able to accelerate 

 •what takes place slowly under ordinary conditions to 

 such a degree that recent experiments show that feld- 

 spar (which may have 10 per cent potash) when able 

 to pass 200 mesh applied to tobacco plants seems to 

 yield up its potash to a large extent. We are not goini; 

 to make any prophecy until we know more. All this 

 about rocks is no new thing and for years there havr 

 been ardent exponents of "Stone Meal Manure.' One 

 foreign proponent has come to the onslaught with :i 

 club called "Bread From Stones," hence the words 

 above. In his preface he asks, "Wliat Will Fertilizin.i: 

 With Stone Meal Accomplish?" 



He says, "It will : 



(1) Turn stones into bread and make barren regions 

 fruitful. 



(2) Feed the liungry. 



(3) Cause healthy cereals and provender to be har- 

 vested and thus prevent epidemics among men and di- 

 seases among animals. 



(4) Make agriculture again profitable and save great 

 sums of money which are now expended on fertilizers that 

 in part are injurious and in part useless. 



(5) Turn the unemployed to country life by revealing 

 the inexhaustible nutritive forces which, unrecognized, are 

 stored up in the rocks, the air and the water." 



There is food for thought in the above, especially as 

 to most granites and feldspars, which are abundant in 

 this part of the country. 



The German Kali (German for potash) Trust which 

 imports tremendous amounts of Stassfurt potash salts 

 in the various forms and purities and advertises in pro- 

 portion hopped up into the air when they heard about 

 potash from granite or feldspar. They have issued a 

 nice little pamphlet all aboitt it and condemn the idea 

 of potash from any such source competing with Stass- 

 furt mines, and the thing is ended once and for all. 



As good Americans, we would like to feel independent 

 of even Brother Wilhelm, but we fear granite rocks 

 won't do it. The dream that appeals to the agricultural 

 chemist is a country like jSTew England full of water- 

 falls and potash in the rocks alongside, for potash can 

 and has been extracted with aid of electricity from fine 

 ground rocks at a much faster rate than water alone 

 would do it. But the German potash salts still hold 

 the field in price. Let us not curse Providence, however, 

 for we have the phosphates in great abundance in the 

 South, and we have hopes that Secretary Eoot didn't go 



to Chile, the home of the nitrate deposits without cast- 

 ing an eye in that direction. 



We have tried to start the idea of soluble fertilizers 

 wliere we first note them and that is in Nature where 

 they a IT dilute and slow coming, but finally "get-there." 



Art and Nature in Garden Making 



WlMl.l, ScLMv Al Vulvli Cul.I.KliK 

 Sandringham, EnglaDd. 



We are told liy the wise peojjle that garden making 

 is an art; they also inform us that this particular art 

 is really an imperfect copy of Nature. This oft re- 

 peated statement at once sets me inquiring as to the 

 truth of the remark. 



To begin with, much depends on what we mean by 

 "Nature." If we understand by that word merely 

 certain phenomena, subject to iLxed and unalterable law, 

 we must admit that man has the power to imitate' nat- 

 ural effects or adapt only, but not to create. Thus, all 

 the arts and crafts of modern garden making are but 

 permutations and combinations of natural laws, when 

 we consider their adaptation to the garden, or rather I 

 should say to that part of the garden which is in the 

 immediate vicinity of the home. If, however, we con- 

 sider that mere utilitarianism does not cover the whole 

 field of our ideas, that we do not exist merely, but strive 

 to obtain peaceful and natural surroundings, then we 

 feel that the restless, unsatisfied efforts of the gardener 

 in whatever way he seeks expression, point to a search 

 for a something of which the visible universe is but the 

 symbol. As a garden at the best is but Nature made 

 more clearly visible to our senses, so it is that Nature 

 can only be understood by those who can read the sym- 

 bol. The true garden maker, therefore, I say, is not an 

 imitator, but an interpreter. 



All people do not see who gaze on the fair work of 

 Nature, with its wonderful balancing of effects and its 

 marvelous blending of colors. Few, indeed, scan it 

 with purged vision. Few can pierce behind the veil, to 

 the throne where Nature sits amid seven-fold splendor. 

 Many people exist in the world to whom the beauty of 



