WATFOKD NATUKAL HISTOKY SOCIETY. liii 



Field Meeting, Hth June, 1879. 

 Harpenden and Rothamsted. 



The object of this Fieki Meetiug being to enable members of the 

 Society to gain some knowledge of the general plan and chief 

 results of the agricultural experiments which have for nearly forty- 

 five years been carried on at Rothamsted, the party which as- 

 sembled at Harpenden Station on the arrival, at three o'clock, of 

 the train from St. Albans, proceeded at once to the " Lawes Testi- 

 monial Laboratory," on Harpenden Common, scarcely noticing the 

 village, whii'h is most beautifully situated, and of considerable 

 interest from its historical associations. Most of the members 

 forming this party, which numbered about thirty, had come by 

 train from Watford to St. Albans, where they were joined by 

 members from that neighbourhood; and on the way from Har- 

 penden Station to the laboratory the number was augmented by 

 members from the eastern side of the county, who had arrived by 

 an earlier train. 



At the laboratory the members were received by Dr. J. H. Gilbert, 

 F.R.S., under whose direction the various experiments have been 

 carried on since 1843 ; at first on a very small scale in a barn near, 

 and since 1855 in this building, which was then presented by public 

 subscription to Mr. John Bennet Lawes, LL.D., F.li.S., who had 

 carried on experiments from about the year 1834, when the 

 Eothamsted estate came into his possession. 



Dr. Gilbert first gave a brief account of the origin, plan, and 

 principal results of the experiments, both in the field and in the 

 laboratory. In the field-experiments " some of the most important 

 crops of rotation, each separately, year after year," have been 

 grown, "for many years in succession on the same land, without 

 manure, with farmyard manure, and with a great variety of 

 chemical manures ; the same description of manure being, as a rule, 

 applied year after year on the same plot. Experiments on an 

 actual course of rotation, with difierent manures, have also been 

 made." At the laboratory samples of all the experimental crops 

 are dried and burnt, and the composition of the ash determined, 

 and weighed portions of the samples and of their ashes are pre- 

 served for future reference, there being about 25,000 bottles con- 

 taining samples of various kinds, including annual products and 

 soils, now in the museum, all of which were seen to be most care- 

 fully and fully labelled. 



Amongst the experiments to which Dr. Gilbert drew attention 

 may be mentioned the determination of the influence of dift'crent 

 seasons on crops similarly treated, of the limit of capability of 

 soils, and of the point of their exhaustion, samples of soils from the 

 experimental plots, for every 9 inches, down to 54 inches in depth, 

 being preserved. In treating of the experiments on the feeding of 

 animals by certain foods, he stated that ash-analyses were made of 

 the indi^-idual organs and parts, the nitrogenous constituents being 

 determined in the various portions before being reduced to ash. 



