IIG liORTUS GRAMINEUS WOBURNENSIS. 



with sufficient accuracy the nature of the soil or different soils 

 employed, and to describe them accordingly. It may here be 

 unnecessary to state, that the basis of every improvement in the 

 cultivation of grasses is, to sow the seeds of those species only 

 which are adapted to the soil ; or, to change the nature of unsuit- 

 able soils to that which is fitted for the growth of grasses most 

 desirable to be cultivated ; and unless this important point is in 

 the first place attended to fully, disappointment, rather than suc- 

 cess, may be expected to follow the labours of the farmer. 



In many instances, where experiments have been made on the 

 produce of plants, this very essential point has been too much 

 disregarded. It is to this only we can look for a satisfactory 

 reason to reconcile the discordance of results obtained from expe- 

 riments made on the same plant by different persons equally emi- 

 nent for agricultural knowledge. From the same source, in a 

 great measure, will be found to proceed the difference of opinion 

 respecting the impoverishing effects of different plants to the soil. 

 It is well known that, on certain soils, some plants have greater 

 impoverishing effects than on others ; and though the preparation 

 of the land, and quantity of manure applied, &c., should be the 

 same in two cases, yet a specific difference in the nature of the 

 soils will give different results as to their produce and impover- 

 ishing effects. 



The terms adopted to denote different soils have been used 

 without due precision, or rather, the terms have had no definite 

 idea affixed to them. The term loam^ for instance, is defined by 

 one to be a fat earth, or marl, and by others a mixture of clay, 

 sand, and calcareous earth, without stating the proportions. 

 In general, on referring to books on Agriculture and Gardening, 

 we are directed to a hazel loam, a brown loam, clayey loam, or to 

 a hungry sandy soil, bog soil, peat earth, garden mould, &c. ; but 

 from the want of proper definitions of these terms, it is perplexing, 

 or nearly impracticable, to determine which kind of soil is meant. 

 I have examined above fifty kinds of soil and composts, collected, 

 with their local names, in different parts of the country, and, in 

 several instances, soils of the same name were found to differ 

 greatly in their natural qualities. 



The method of determining the nature of soils by chemical 

 analysis has been of late years so much simplified by Sir Humpiiry 

 Davy, that it is now in the power of every practical person to 

 ascertain with comparative facility the qualities of any kind of 



