NITRATES QUESTION 429 



people, a number proportionately less than one-half that being fed in 

 Japan to-day, very different practices from those we are now follow- 

 ing will have been adopted." But, he says, first must come the 

 conviction of the need of plant feeding and better soil management. 

 Soil Exhaustion and Wheat. Since wheat is the source of the 

 " daily bread" of a large portion of civilized mankind, the wheat 

 supply question affords a concrete problem in soil exhaustion. 

 The matter can best be brought to the thoughtful reader's atten- 

 tion by citing a few passages from the Presidential address made 

 to the British association at Bristol in 1898 by Sir William Crookes, 

 O.M., F.R.S. The importance of the man and the importance 

 of the occasion combined to given the address great weight. Quot- 

 ing passages from the third edition of this address (published in 

 1917), we find the opinions of Sir William expressed in these words: 



"My chief subject is of interest to the whole world to every race to 

 every human being. It is of urgent importance to-day, and it is a life-and- 

 death question, for generations to come. I mean the question of Food supply. 

 Many of my statements you may think of the alarmist order; certainly they 

 are depressing, but they are founded on stubborn facts. They show that 

 England and all civilized nations stand in deadly peril of not having enough 

 to eat. As mouths multiply, food resources dwindle. Land is a limited quan- 

 tity, and the land that will grow wheat is absolutely dependent on difficult 

 and capricious natural phenomena. I am constrained to show that our wheat 

 producing soil is totally unequal to the strain put upon it ... Wheat is the 

 most sustaining food grain of the great Caucasian race, which includes the 

 peoples of Europe, United States, British America, the white inhabitants of 

 South Africa, Australasia, parts of South America, and the white population 

 of the European colonies. Of late years the individual consumption of wheat 

 has almost universally increased. In Scandinavia it has risen 100 per cent 

 in twenty-five years; in Austria-Hungary, 80 per cent; in France 70 per cent; 

 while in Belgium it has increased 50 per cent. Only in Russia and Italy, and 

 possibly Turkey, has the consumption of wheat declined. In 1871 the bread 

 eaters of the world numbered 371,000,000. In 1881 the number rose to 

 416,000,000; in 1891 to 472,000,000, and at the present time (1898) they 

 number 516,500,000 . . . 



"It is now recognized that all crops require what is called a 'dominant' 

 manure. Some need nitrogen, some potash, others phosphates. Wheat pre- 

 eminently demands nitrogen, fixed in the form of ammonia or nitric acid ..." 



Nitrates Question. Sir William referred to experiments at 

 Rothamsted in the use of nitrate of soda in improving the yield of 

 wheat. A field was planted with wheat 13 consecutive years 

 without manure, yielding an average of 11.9 bushels to the acre. 

 For the next 13 years it was seeded with wheat, and dressed with 

 560 pounds of nitrate of soda per acre, other mineral constituents 

 also being present. The average yield for these years was 36.4 

 bushels per acre an increase of 24.5 bushels. In other words, 

 each 22.86 pounds of nitrate of soda produced an increase of one 

 bushel of wheat. 



