232 WHAT I KNOW OF FARMING. 



freely nearly all the elements, required of it, provided 

 the plants are otherwise in healthful and thrifty con- 

 dition. Water is supplied from the sky, or from 

 springs and streams ; and little more than the most 

 ordinary capacity for observation is required to deter- 

 mine when it is present in sufficient quantity, when 

 in baleful excess. But who, unaided by Science, 

 can decide whether the soil does or does not contain 

 the elements requisite for the luxuriant growth and 

 perfect development of Wheat, or Fruit, or Grass, 

 or Beets, or Apples ? Who knows, save as he blindly 

 infers from results, what mineral ingredients of 

 this or that crop are deficient in a given field, and 

 what are present in excess ? And how shah 1 any one 

 be enlightened and assured on the point, unless by 

 the aid of Science ? 



I have bought and applied to my farm some two 

 thousand bushels of Lime, and ten or a dozen tuns of 

 Plaster ; and I infer, from what seemed to be results, 

 that each of these minerals has been applied with 

 profit ; but I do not know it. The increased product 

 which I have attributed to one or both of these ele- 

 ments may have had a very different origin and im- 

 pulse. I only grope my way in darkness when I 

 should clearly and surely see. 



An agricultural essayist in Maine has recently put 

 forth a canon which, if well grounded, is of great 

 value to farmers. He asserts that the growth of acid 

 plants like Sorrel, Dock, etc., in a field, results from 

 sourness in the soil, and that, where this exists, Lime 



