18S2.I 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



1751 



could be driven off by red heat, had been driven, 

 when watered by water impregnated with nitrate 

 of potash, and phosphoric acid ; thence they have 

 jumped to the conclusion, that plant food con- 

 sists of nitrogenous and phosphoratic matter 

 alone. They were scientists, and their conclu- 

 sions were the end of the law on that subject. 

 Let us see. The soil they experimented with 

 before burning contained vegetable matter. This 

 became charcoal, in part, and so was left in the 

 soil, or its mineral properties were changed in 

 form ; the potash and phosphorous became solu- 

 ble; the lime, magnesia and soda became caustic, 

 and much of it soluble, and thus also plant food. 

 Of this no note was taken. 



Again, they kept back the fact that the plants 

 rea red by them in their experiments were starved 

 acd dwarfed, and only gave a yield of less than 

 one-tenth what they would if grown upon a soil 

 rich in vegetable matter. Humus is a vegetable 

 product, and exists only where there has been 

 a decomposition of vegetable matter. No vigor- 

 ous growth of plants can be had, particularly in 

 farm and garden products, where the soil con 

 tains no humus. 



They have entirely left out of their calculations 

 the whole eflBcatiousness of the principle of life 

 How much is due to this principle, where it shall 

 seek means for its own existence, how it may 

 substitute one ingredient of food for another, and 

 all its vast phenomena is ignored by them. 

 What life is, what its functions, they cannot 

 explain, because they never can know. 



Are opinions thus arrived at to overthrow the 

 experience of the practical agriculturist for 

 ages? These last have learned that their heavi 

 est crops grow on land, other things being equal, 

 in which there is the greatest amount of finely 

 pulverized vegetable matter. Hence, too, the best 

 farmers delight in spreading upou field and 

 garden, the manure from the stables, the hen- 

 roosts, and barnyard ; hence, we find these men 

 to increase their pile, bedding their cattle on 

 dried muck, and scattering it under the roost. 

 Hence they pulverize it with mixing caustic lime, 

 and grind it to powder, as far as possible. Leaf- 

 mould has ever been a favorite prescription for 

 the florist, when extra choice flowers are required. 

 But leaf-mould differs very little from muck, in 

 its constituent parts ; both are composed of the 

 leaves and small stems of plants. 



All vegetation placed in the soil, within the 

 reach of the influence of the sun's heat, rains 

 and dews, will be converted to humus, and thus 



fitted for plant food. And then through the 

 medium of humus the plants receive the min- 

 erals required for ihe formation of wood, leaves 

 and fruit. They receive them almost entirely 

 through this source. Because the experimenters 

 with soil deprived of vegetable matter, as far as 

 heat could do, had none or very little humus to 

 assist them, their plants are dwarfed, and almost 

 unproductive; and instead of proving that plant 

 food consisted of nitrogenous matter, potash and 

 phosphorus, they rather proved where these 

 are supplied with vegetable matter, like decaying 

 grass, weeds, and leaves of trees, yielding an 

 abundance of humus, they would have fiir better 

 results ; and that it was better to apply vegetable 

 matters to the land, even if the poor, despised 

 muck of the wet lands of Massachusetts, the 

 sweepings of the streets of the cities, and the 

 mud in the bottom of the ditches and drains 

 were hauled out at a great expense, than to have 

 none in it. 



Against the assertion of such experimenters, 

 as declare muck "worthless," there stands the 

 experiments of all the gardeners, of all the States, 

 who have applied muck in some of its "forms 

 and modifications" to all varieties of soils, and 

 always obtained favorable results from its use. 

 With the gardeners, the farmers, who spread the 

 manures from their stables and yards on their 

 grain fields, who turn under their clover turf and 

 harvest great crops of wheat, bear evidence. The 

 tobacco growers of Virginia exhausted their soil 

 because they did not apply to it vegetable mat- 

 ters, even where they did also use guano and 

 other prepared fertilizers ; while those of the 

 Connecticut Valley, of the Chemung Valley in 

 Xew York, and of Dane and Eock counties in 

 Wisconsin, have not only kept their tobacco lands 

 in heart, but have greatly increased the richness 

 and productiveness of their soil and crops, by a 

 liberal use of vegetable matters. The cottoa 

 planters of the South also give a negative testi- 

 mony of the value of vegetable matter. These 

 have for years burned all the weeds, grass, and 

 old cotton and cornstalks which grow on their 

 land, and have resorted to the manures of labor- 

 atories to rear a crop. The result with them has 

 been the same as witn the Virginia tobacco 

 growers — worn out fields, and no remunerative 

 crops. The prepared fertilizers, with a scant 

 supply of humus, has only '' burnt" the stunted 

 plants. 



The examples of the English, Dutch, German 

 and French gardeners and farmers, could be 



