AGRICULTURAL TEXT-BOOK. 7 



they are also abundant or rare, according to the proportional 

 existence of these circumstances. 



18. A plant not indigenous to a given locality, will grow and 

 flourish, if transplanted, in exact proportion as it finds the ma 

 terials and circumstances in its new locality the same as in ite 

 native one, 



1 9. These facts are the ground-work of Agriculture as an in 

 telligent art 



20. Comparatively few plants exist which are useful to man, 

 and these, in their wild state, are naturally confined to narrow 

 bounds. The business of the Farmer is, therefore, to cause such 

 plants as he requires, to grow where he wishes them ; and not 

 only to grow, but by artificial adaptation of circumstances to 

 compel them to yield so abundantly that their intrinsic valu* 

 ia greater than that of the labor bestowed upon them. 



21. A striking example of this principle may be given in th 

 growth of the Pine Apple in England. This is a plant requir 

 ing the heat of a long tropical summer in order that it may 

 perfect its fruit Until steamships plied between the West In 

 dies and Great Britain, this fruit could not be carried to the 

 laiter country, without rotting. But so delicious is the flavor, 

 that the English were not willing to be deprived of it They 

 consequently formed, by means of glass-houses and furnaces, a 

 tropical atmosphere : they imitated the rich organic son 1 in which 

 this plant is found to flourish ; they supplied the moisture neoe- 

 ary at certain periods of growth; and not only brought th* 

 fruit to perfection, but greatly improved it in size and flavor. 



22. The principles may therefore be laid down, (a,) u that 

 out of nothing, nothing is made ; &quot; if it is desired to grow a 

 given plant in abundance, all the elements that enter into that 

 plant must be supplied in abundance, (b J all other circumstan 

 ces requisite to its perfection in its native state must also be fui- 

 nished ; (c,) that plants cannot be grown where these requisites 

 are deficient ; (d,) but that it is in the power of the Farmer, by 



