182 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE. 
DESMCODIUM. 
Besides the analyses of the grasses, an analysis has been made of this 
plant, to the results of which especial attention is called. 
By reference to the analysis it will be at once seen how large an amount 
of albuminoids is present, and fer the purpose of comparison the anal- 
ysis of red clover is placed below with that of this plant. 
Desmodium. Red elover. - 
Per cent. Per cent. 
Garpolydrates Seeec. Secs ce cee ee oS eee oe ee ee one cee: AB ee 41.0 
iii aminierds (22 <4" rns © <3 2) onrs  R eeg o ree eS OTT 16.1 
Gebinloses eee ttre 2 Oe ke et ee ee ee ne ORE Beye 4. 
RSS Nig meee Sn St Oe Ae Pee NS Ye ene CNS eee eee iiss 
100. 00 i 
For convenience of comparison ‘he carbohydrates are grouped together. 
It will be seen that the albuminoids of the Desmodium are to those in 
red clover as 132 to 100, while the amount of ash varies but slightly in 
the two plants. The immense value of clover as a crop preparatory to 
other crops, especially wheat, is well known, and there is perhaps no 
way by which exhausted lands may be more rea .dily restored to fertility, 
and maintained in such condition, than by the use of clover; certainly 
there is no method which compares with it in expense. Now, although 
clover requires an amount of plant food, both mineral and atmospheric, 
far in excess of a wheat crop, nevertheless it is a fact very well estab- 
lished that the former crop may be successfully grown upon a field where 
wheat would invariably fail of a good. crop. 
The reasons for this are to be seen in a Ps of the two plants; 
and, although it is a “thrice told tale,” the importance of the subject, 
especially in connection with this plant under consideration, is such that 
every farmer should practically understand the matter. 
Clover and wheat, then, belong to two families of plants, which in 
nearly every respect are in the strongest contrast. 
Clover is one of the dicotyledonous ‘plants, or those of which theseed is 
divided into halves, as with the pea, bean, &c. These plants are char- 
acterized also by a strong tap-root, which, descending into the subsoil, 
enables the plant to secure nourishment from sources “beyond the reach 
of plants of the other sort. 
Wheat, on the contrary, belongs to the monocotyled lonous plants, the 
seeds of which are not so divided in halves Ss, as Indian cern for example. 
The roots of this family of plants are surface or crown roots, and are 
destitute of the tap-root already spoken of. 
‘Again, if we consider the habits of growth of the two plants, we have 
in clover a plant of continuous growth throughout the season "until eut 
down by frost or the scythe of the mower, and an enormous leaf deyel- 
opment, as compared with wheat with its cca leafage and its short 
life, We pave, then, in clover a plant with a tap-root and an enormous 
root development, enabling it to ‘seek out and assimilate mineral food, 
with great extent of leaf surface, fitting it to take in and assimilate at- 
mospheric food; a long period of growth, which causes it to appro- 
priate the greatest amo mant of beth kinds of food and store them up in 
root and stem. In wheat, on the other hand, we have a surface-rooted 
plant, a seanty leafage, and a short period of growth. What wonder, 
then, that so coarse a feeder as clover should thrive, even where so dainty 
a plant as wheat should utterly fail, asis sooften the case? But, as 
