273 



FARMERS' REGISTER 



[No. 5 



the Alps,) as effectually as fifty times that proportion. 

 Just so, no pine grows on the limestone soils of Virginia 

 and Kentucky, though there is generally only enough 

 lime in thein to neutndize the soils, and not enough to 

 leave the smallest excess ol'Jime in the form oicarbunaie. 

 And the smallest deficiency of lime, below the amount 

 necessary to neutralize the whole acid principles of the 

 soil, permits that necessary food to be furnished to the 

 larch, pine, and sorrel, and of course, permits their 

 growth, wherever the climate is not too unfavorable. 



So far as our yet few and imperfect lights extend on 

 this subject, we should rely oit the most sure vegetable 

 indications of acid and neuiral .soils, with as much con- 

 fidence, as OH the a,nalyses of the best chemists, and 

 far moi-e s«than on any ordinary experimenters. The 

 Vules given by this wiiter, for partial analyses of soils, 

 and which he deems preferable, and sufficient, are of no 

 value; as almost every cultivated soil contains enough 

 silex to scratch glass — enough clay (or alumine) to be 

 kneaded, or made into a lump vyhen moist — and, in his 

 country, (Eni^laiid,) most soils are enough calcareous to 

 effervesce with acids; though in Virtjinia scarcely any 

 are so. Therefore, soils of all possible grades, and the 

 most different qu:ilities, might be tried by his tests, and 

 found to give the very similar results. 



There is, as yet, but little know-n on this subject. 

 iBut however few the known facts, they are not the 

 ^ess important, and the inducement is great to men of 

 science to pursue the investigation. Ed. Far. Reg.] 



From the Quaitmly Journal of AgrieuUure. 



STUDIES IN THE SCIENCE AND PRACTICE 

 OF AGRICULTURE, AS CONNECTED WITH 

 PHYSICS. 



Nutritive principles of animal food contained in 

 grain and roots. 



Towards the end of the 17th century, the illus- 

 trious Dutch observer Leeuwenhoeck, in his mi- 

 croscopical researches, examined, amongst other 

 things, portions of wheat flour, which we now know 

 to consist of'a various mixture of'starch, gluten, oil, 

 resin, sugar and gum; and by one of those happy 

 chances ah-eady exemplified, was led to make a 

 shrewd conjei-.ture respecting the real constitution 

 of Hour made from grain. In the wheat flour he 

 found globules {glt)buUfarinarit,) each as he sup- 

 pose!^ funished wiih a yessel, by which the plas- 

 tic mailer passes in order to produce globules, — 

 an opiical illusion, as has since been shown; but in 

 subsequently studying those globules, he shrewd- 

 ly asks whether they be not enclosed, as in the 

 case of seeds, in some sort of membrane. "I 

 then," he adds, "used my utmost endeavors to 

 discover the jnlernai hidden make of the oflobules 

 of meal, wherein, at lenijlh to my great salisiac- 

 tion, I succeeded."* He describes the grains ol 

 wheat as principally composed of those minute 

 globules which are sinirly transparent, and lie 

 closely compacted within a kind of membranes, 

 so exquisitely thin and transparent, that in some 

 places their texture is not to be discerned. JVI. 



*Hoole'3 Select Works of Leeuwenhoeck, p. 179. 



Blot has said, that Leeuvveniioeck observed the 

 grain of lecula (rather (iirina) to be composed of 

 a vesicle atid a soluble subsiance, which is itg nu- 

 tritive pari, since nothing but the shells or husks 

 are met with in the dung uf animals. 



Novv tlu'se observations of Leeuwenhoeck 

 were lost sight of, as that of Huygens had been 

 relative lo the polarization of light, till, eight or 

 ten years ago, the subject was taken up by M. 

 Raspail, appariMiily without being aware of what 

 Leeuvvenhoei'k had published, and he has so sim- 

 plilied the views of the cotisiituents of the nutri- 

 tive principles contained in litrinaceous substances, 

 as to leiuier them, when conjoined vvitli the re- 

 scarcheis of Biol, Persoz, Felouzc, and others, of 

 the highest interest to scientific agriculiurists. 



It may be remarked, in |)assiiig, that M. Raspail* 

 endeavors lo shew that Leeuweidioeck's observa- 

 tions afforded not even a glimpse of liis own dis- 

 coveries, and that M. Biot has misunderstood or 

 misrepresented his meaning. In ihe quotations 

 from Leeuwenhoeck above, however, which we 

 have given in Iloole's excellent translation, it 

 will be seen that M. Raspail himself has not 

 translated unbiassedly. Hoole was dead before 

 Ras|)ail's discovery. From the experiments of 

 M. (le Saussure, it. was believed that he had pro- 

 cured the chemical basis of starch, which he term- 

 ed amedlve. This amedine may be procured by 

 boiling starch in a large (;uantity of water, throw- 

 ing it on a double filter; and by boiling again the 

 matter remaining on the filter, filtering again, and 

 diyinirthe resulue. The substance ihus obtain- 

 ed, after repeated washings and dryinsis, is in irre- 

 irular white or yellowish-white Iragments, very 

 ti'iable, and without taste or smell. M. Saussure 

 said this formed with potass a non-viscid solution, 

 was insoluble in water below tlie temperature ol' 

 140°. and did not form a jelly vvith boiling water. 

 But M. Raspail shows, liiat what was supposed 

 to be a solution in water at 140*^, is only a sus- 

 pension. Saussure liiiled most signally in disco- 

 vering the nutritive ba.sis, of starch, which he 

 ought to have souiiht for, not on the filter, but in 

 the liquid which had passed ihrouuh the filter, 



Berzelius is no less in error than Saussure, 

 when he states, as quoted by M. Raspail (^Chimie 

 Organiqve). that starch or lecula is composed of 

 small crystals, which partly dissolve in water at 

 an ordinary temperature. On the contrary, the 

 micro? cope shows, that starch or lecula is compos- 

 ed of shininij white smooth globules, quite insol- 

 uble in cold water, even when immersed for any 

 lensrth of time. 



The globules of starch, indeed, consist of an 

 envelope or shell, and a kernel, if it maybe so call- 

 ed, of a substance very ditft>rent, — the chief dis- 

 covery. of M. Raspail, which serves to explain 

 the errors and discrepancies of previous observers; 

 for the envelope is altogether insoluble in cold 

 as well as in boiling-water, and it is only what we 

 shall Ibr the present lerm the kernel that is at all sol- 

 uble. The partial solubility, therefore, observed 

 by Berzelius, must have arisen from the acciden- 

 tal rupture of some of the envelopes by which 

 means the water could obtain admission to the 

 kernels. 



Accordingly, when Berzelius states that starch 

 is dissolved into a mucilaginous liquid by boiling- 



* Chimie Organjque, sub fin. 



