On Ercfot. 443 



on some soils, but wliicli may be of comparatively little use 

 in a particular locality. Pasture soils vary much in composition 

 and physical characters, and hence the same manures which effect 

 a radical improvement on pastures in one locality are often found 

 to be of little use in another place. For this reason it is difficult 

 and hazardous to prescribe manuring' compounds for g-rass-land. 

 In a general wav it may be stated that manures rich in nitrogen 

 and readily available phosphoric acid, produce the greatest and 

 most beneficial effect on grass-land. There is no pasture, the 

 ])roductiyeness of which may not be largely increased by a heavy 

 dressing- of farmyard manure or by a top-dressing of guano, or 

 by artificial manuring mixtures composed of ammonia-salts or 

 nitrate of soda and superphosphate of lime. In some cases I 

 have also found the use of potash salts very beneficial in con- 

 junction with superphosphate and guano, or in combination with 

 superphosphate and nitrate of soda. 



Unfortunately the application of artificial manures to per- 

 manent pasture is often disappointing in an economical point of 

 view. As a rule, no artificial manuring mixture gives so favourable 

 a return as good farmyard manure ; and I cannot help thinking 

 that it would be more profitable for a farmer to apply the larger 

 portion of his yard manure rather to his pasture land than to the 

 arable land : for there is no difficulty in growing roots and cereal 

 crops economically Avith artificial manures, but I am not so 

 certain that, as a rule, it will be found a profitable undertaking to 

 manure permanent pasture with artificial manures. 



Laboratori/, 11, SaUshury Square, Fleet Street, 

 London, June, 1874. 



XVII. — On Ergot. By Wm. Caeruthers, F.R.S,, Consulting 

 Botanist to the Society. 



Ergot might supply an interesting text from which to exhibit 

 the worthlessness of speculation as opposed to observation and 

 experiment in dealing with natural science. Replacing, as it 

 <l(jes, the seeds of different grasses, and alwavs attaining, when 

 full grown, a greater size than the normal seed, it was at first 

 thought to indicate an extra quantity of life and vigour in the 

 particular seed, which exhausted themselves in the production of 

 the anomalous horned grain. No special properties were asso- 

 ciated with these abnormal productions. All along the ergot 



