CHEMICAL FARMING 223 



potatoes and tomatoes has excelled everything of its 

 kind known. In the proportion of two to three thou- 

 sand bushels of potatoes to the acre, and in a space 

 ten feet square he produced nearly a ton of tomatoes, 

 of marvelous, brilliant color, and most delicious 

 flavor. Gladioli grew over six feet in height, and to- 

 bacco to a height of twelve feet, doubling the nor- 

 mal yield and of improved quality. 



For my own work with this method, as with the 

 Story of the Fly and the Termite, or any other sub- 

 ject, I worked out its life story. Of necessity I raise 

 my own flies, termites, plants, etc., watch with the 

 eye of the camera, as well as my own, every stage or 

 step, and like a physician, study and note each symp- 

 tom, as he would that of an infant, too young to tell 

 him what was wrong: "Ask the flower" is no idle 

 answer to the perplexities besetting a chemical 

 farmer, and so one soon learns to recognize the plant's 

 trouble by its color and general appearance, as the 

 physician does that of his inarticulate patients, so to 

 meet their requirements. In the Tomato, spotting 

 and yellowing of the leaf means it is suffering from 

 potash hunger, while a deepening of the green color, 

 with additional purple in lower surface, indicates a 

 phosphorus deficiency. With a lack of calcium, in 

 extreme cases, leaves become pointed, dry, soon die 

 and drop. Lack of iron in plant diet soon turns leaves 



