12 



and promotes the happiness of those who pursue a delightful but 

 necessarily laborious calling. I owe it to candor to express my 

 doubt whether any Geologist however skillful or Naturalist how 

 ever learned or scientific, can, by traversing the State, collecting 

 and arranging statistics of the average crops and calling the at 

 tention of farmers, to the well-known deposits of marl, muck, lime 

 &c., in their respective vicinities, succeed in supplying the place 

 of intelligent enquiry and careful observation in an enlightened 

 farming community. There is no royal road to the successful pur 

 suit of Agriculture any more than to any branch of domestic in 

 dustry or department of science. 



In regard to the chemical analysis of soils arid some of the 

 requisites of a valuable analysis I propose to offer a few remarks. 

 A plant derives the principal part of its sustenance from the soil. 

 The soil must contain certain fertilizing elements in due propor 

 tions to secure the perfect growth of the plant. If the soil be 

 deficient in one or more of these essential elements, chemical anal 

 ysis can detect the cause of the evil and point out the remedy 

 &quot;But,&quot; says Dr. John D. Easter, &quot; the growth of plants is influ 

 enced by a multitude of other circumstances to which chemical 

 analysis can furnish no clue, a soil may abound in all the elements 

 of a very fertile one and yet be perfectly barren. The soil of the 

 great Colorado desert in California, which I have recently anal 

 ysed, furnishes a good example of this. It possesses in abundance 

 every element necessary to extreme fertility, but is entirely barren 

 from the want of water. 



The reverse of this also frequently occurs. The chemist re 

 ceives a specimen of the soil, in the chemical constitution of which 

 he can detect no deficiency, and in his laboratory, he can assign no 

 cause for its alleged unproductiveness. An examination of the lo 

 cality probably shows him that it is underlaid by a stiff, tenacious 

 sub-soil, which retains an excess of watei\ and no provision has 

 been made for drainage. 



The difference in the mechanical texture of stiff and loose soils 

 is familiar to every one. The fertility of many stiff clays may be 

 seriously impaired by ploughing too wet, rendering them tough 

 and impenetrable to the tender rootlets of plants. In this case, as 

 no chemical change takes place, the chemist in his laboratory would 

 seek in vain for the cause of the difficulty. 



