364 EUROPEAN AGRICULTURE. 



plied in a green state, and fully charged with animal matter. It 

 was also ascertained that bones applied as a manure, beyond a 

 certain point, were not efficacious in proportion to the quantity 

 applied ; and that sixty bushels of bones to an acre, produced no 

 more beneficial effect than sixteen or twenty. Here experience 

 and inquiry were confounded, and here science came trium 

 phantly to their aid. 



Upon examination, it was ascertained that what gave the 

 efficacy to bones was the phosphorus contained in them, con 

 nected with an acid. It was not ascertained that the animal 

 portion of the bones was of no importance ; but it was slower in 

 its effects, in ameliorating the soil, than the inorganic portion of 

 the bones ; and that what was mainly important, in the application 

 of bones, was to supply this inorganic portion in a form that it 

 should speedily be taken up. In an ordinary state, this phos 

 phorus was combined with lime, in such proportions that it was 

 not easily dissolved ; but, Professor Liebig, to whom agricultural 

 science is so greatly indebted, discovered that, by the application 

 of sulphuric acid to the bones, a portion of this lime would be 

 abstracted, and go into another form ; and a salt would be left con 

 taining a much larger proportion of phosphorus, and so called 

 the super-phosphate of lime, which was soluble in water, and 

 would be at once taken up by the plant. 



&quot; Phosphate of lime is a substance very difficult of solution : 

 and thus, in a very dry season, the effects of bones are slight 

 and imperfect. Super-phosphate of lime, on the other hand, is 

 extremely soluble, so much so that the vitriolized bones can be 

 entirely dissolved or suspended in water, and thus applied. This 

 at once explains the cause of the valuable properties of the 

 preparation. The bones in their natural state are extremely 

 indigestible ; the acid cooks them con verts them into a species 

 of soup, which can readily be eaten and digested by the young 

 turnips. The adamantine fetters, with which the various ele 

 ments composing bones are bound so compactly together, are 

 by means of this new agent burst asunder the compact is 

 broken, and each constituent element is left to pursue its own 

 course, and exercise its own natural affinities.&quot; * 



The effects of this preparation of the bones has answered 



* Spooner s Prize Essay. Journal of the Royal Agricultural Society, vol. vii. p. 1 



