

Section B.— CHEMISTRY, GEOLOGY, METALLURGY, 

 MINERALOGY AND GEOGRAPHY. 



President of the Section. — Prof. B. de St. J. van der Riet. 



M.A., Ph.D. 



TUESDAY, JULY 2. 



The President delivered the following address: — 



THE NEED OF A SURVEY OF AGRICULTURAL SOILS 

 IN SOUTH AFRICA. 



In selecting the subject on which I have the honour to address 

 you, I have been influenced by the firm conviction that the 

 attention of our scientific men and of the general public should 

 be directed to the question of how best to promote agriculture in 

 South Africa by means of scientific work, particularly in chemis- 

 try and geology. If anyone who takes an interest in the analysis 

 of soils will inquire what is being done at present in the way of 

 extending and developing the investigations initiated by Dr. 

 Juritz in Cape Town eighteen years ago, he will learn that there 

 is no systematic soil survey in progress ; that co-ordinated in- 

 vestigation in agricultural chemistry is apparently non-existent in 

 our Government laboratories ; and that the laboratories 

 themselves, as regards room accommodation and equipment, are 

 unsuited for the work which should be done in them. 



Before proceeding to the main subject of my address, which 

 will deal with the need of a systematic survey of agricultural 

 soils in South Africa, allow me to diverge for a moment in order 

 to say a few words in appreciation of the interesting work entitled 

 "A Text-book of Rand Metallurgical Practice, vol. i.," which 

 has recently been published. The authors of this manual (Stokes, 

 Thomas, Smart, Dowling, White, Johnson, Caldecott and John- 

 ston) have brought together in a compact and lucid form a fund 

 of useful information regarding prevailing practice and policy 

 on the Witswatersrand gold-mining area. To quote from the 

 pieface, they have produced 



" ' a working tool ' for those concerned in each branch of ore reduction 

 and treatment practice, and a guide to fellow-workers operating under 

 similar conditions in other parts of the world." 



Their book, which is written chiefly for specialists in metallurgy, 

 should appeal to many in South Africa who are not directly 

 interested in mining. It is of value not merely because of the 

 facts it contains, difficult though it certainly is to obtain such full 

 and reliable data on any South African subject ; the authors may 



