NITROGEN IS NOT UNDER TWO FORMS IN SOILS. SCi) 



manures, tlie albumen of tlie blood, the rape-cake, or the 

 gelatine, was gradually converted into ammonia, and so 

 became operative ; but it was taken for granted as a 

 matter of course, that the so-called inoperative nitro- 

 genous compounds present in the soil do not possess the 

 power of yielding ammonia, or of being oxydised into 

 nitric acid. 



It was well known, mdeed, j:hat if one of two fields 

 contained more lime than the other, the one richer in lime 

 often did not on that account produce more clover. Yet 

 no one thought of assuming that the hme in the richer 

 field existed in a two-fold condition, operative and in- 

 operative, or that the active portion of the lime had 

 caused the difference in the clover crops. 



It was also well known that if two fields be manured 

 with the same bone-earth, the one often gave a higher 

 crop than the other, and yet no one thought of assuming 

 that in the second field the inefficiency of the bone-earth 

 was due to the fact that it had passed into a state of 

 inactivity. 



It was further knoA\ii, that the excess of no individual 

 nutritive substance exercised any influence upon the j^ro- 

 duce of a field ; but it was assumed that the case must be 

 different with nitrogen. A surplus of that element, it 

 was surmised, must act, and if it did not, the cause was 

 not ascribed to the field, but to tlie nature and condi- 

 tion of the nitrogenous compounds. 



- From this w^e see that the notion of nitroi^en exertino; 

 the principal influence in agriculture led to unexampled 

 confusion of thought and to the most baseless and absurd 

 suppositions. None of the advocates of this theory gave 

 themselves the slightest trouble to extract from the ground 

 one of the nitrogenous compounds, which were deemed 

 inoperative, so as to study its nature ; Init properties were 



