54 Di' Seller on the Nutrition of Plants. 



which lasts for an evening, destroys between 1 and 2 ounces 

 of carbon. Hence, in the 250,000,000 of families which make 

 up the gi*eat family of the human race, the nightly consump- 

 tion of tallow, oil, or the like, must amount to many millions 

 of pounds. 



Some crops are raised to be bui*ned ; so that the whole, 

 or nearly the whole, annual produce would be so much loss 

 to the organic matter of the general soil. Of this kind are 

 tobacco, kelp, and barilla. 



In the process of fermentation, by which wine, beer, 

 spirits, and vinegar, are produced, a large quantity of organic 

 matter is reduced to the mineral state, and that without de- 

 nying the name of organic compounds to the wine, beer, 

 alcohol, and vinegar, formed in the mean time. How enor- 

 mous, then, must have been the total loss of organic matter 

 in this way since the time when the secret of converting the 

 juice of the grape into wine was first discovered. To the 

 waste caused in this way should be added that which takes 

 place daily by the formation of carbonic acid, in making fer- 

 mented bread. 



But the loss by these last sources of destruction are as 

 nothing compared with that which takes place everywhere, 

 but particularly in cities, by the complete decomposition of 

 numerous animal and vegetable substances, the refuse of both 

 organic kingdoms, when that refuse fails to be collected and 

 applied to its proper use, as manure to the soil. How little 

 of the organic matter conveyed from every gi*eat town to the 

 adjacent sea or river escapes complete decomposition ! The 

 product of all our fisheries can make but a small reduction 

 on the amount of this loss. How much of such organic 

 matter is carried away annually from the soil itself by rivers, 

 to become incorporated with the deposits that are ever form- 

 ing at their confluence with the sea. 



All the numei'ous articles of furniture, clothes, and equip- 

 ment in general use, composed of linen, woollen, cotton, 

 straw, leather, furs, hair, horn, bone, and ivory, by the hy- 

 pothesis denied by Liebig, draw their origin exclusively from 

 the organic matter of the soil ; and whatever part of these 

 undergoes complete decomposition, or fails to return to the 



