240 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



seven hundred aad thirty-three thousand, one hundred and ninety-three. 

 The loss of fertility, to which by the exportation of animal and other pro- 

 ducts, I will endeavor to show. There were in the United States, in the 

 year 1850, eighty-five million, two hundred and ninety-three thousand, 

 one hundred and fifty animals, including horses, asses, mules, horned cat- 

 tle, sheep and swine. If all the excrementitious matter derived from 

 these animals were returned to the soil from which they derived suste- 

 nance, they would retain in fertility, by the application, perhaps, of nitro- 

 gen, forty-two million, one hundred and forty-five thousand, one hundred 

 and seventy-five acres. 



Wheat is the most important among the cultivated cerealia, whether we 

 regard the value of its produce to the agriculturist, or the very important 

 uses to which it may be applied, in culinary, baking and confectionary 

 arts. It has followed the progress of man's civilization, in all the coun- 

 tries suitable to its growth, from the earliest times, and is, probably, 

 coeval with the creation. It was first sown in this country on the Eliza- 

 beth islands, in Massachusetts, by Gosnold, in 1602. In 1776 the Hessian 

 fly was introduced in some straw, on the west end of Long Island ; from 

 that point it spread at the rate of twenty -five to thirty miles a day, and is 

 now everywhere, and in some places more congenial to it than others, the 

 ravages have become so great as to induce growers to abandon the cultiva- 

 tion of this important grain. Still, prior to 1850, there was an increase 

 in the United States of about fifteen million, six hundred and forty-five 

 thousand, three hundred and seventy-eight bushels. 



In 1850 we raised one hundred millon, five hundred and three thousand, 

 eight hundred and ninety-nine bushels, notwithstanding, in some of the 

 largest wheat growing States the crop of 1849 fell far below the average. 

 At the London exhibition there was no wheat exhibited superior to that 

 grown in Genesee county, this State, which received the prize medal. 



Now 44,400 lbs. of wheat, grown on twenty-five acres, would be all the 

 farinaceous food required to be consumed by one hundred adult persons in 

 a year, and it would contain 



Potass and soda, 368 pounds. 



Lime and magnesia, 177 



Phosphoric acid, 486 



Silica, 21 



Metallic oxides, 5 



Nitrogen, 1,021 



Sulphur and chlorine, a fraction. 



2,078 



In order, then, to grow a crop of wheat, annually, on the same twenty- 

 five acres, it would be necessary to return these elements removed by the 

 crop ; if it is exported, the loss of fertility will be equal to the quantity 

 of valuable chemicals taken away in the wheat. 



