290 



FARMERS' REGISTER— SCHOOLS FOR FARMERS' SONS. 



ant. — I generally use it and clean water alternate- 

 ly, and always overhead in summer; but except 

 for the purpose of cleaning, it might be used con- 

 stantly with advantage; and thougli I cannot 

 speak iVoni my own experience, never having had 

 either scale or bug on my pines, (pine apples) yet 

 I think it highly probable, as the ammonia it con- 

 tains is known to be destructive to these insects in 

 a state of gas or vapor, that in a liquid state, it 

 does not totally destroy them, yet that it will in a 

 great degree check their progress. 



Other materials for liquid manures are often dif- 

 ficult to procure, and tedious in their preparation: 

 but soot, sufficient tor the gardener's ])urposes, is 

 almost every where at hand, and in a few minutes 

 prepared. 



Were gardeners more generally aware that no 

 manures can be taken up in a state of solidity by 

 plants as food, and that they can only be absorbed 

 iDy them in a gaseous or liquid state, to which all 

 solid manures applied must be previously reduced, 

 before any benefit can be derived from them, they 

 would in many cases facilitate the process by us- 

 ing them in a liquid state. In houses (green and 

 hot houses) where the rains have not access, it ap- 

 pears to me superior to any other mode of admin- 

 istering manures to trees. 



Kilkenny, Aug. 2t, 1826. 



Qiiere. — Has any system been adopted for col- 

 lecting at one or more deposites the soot of this 

 and other large cities? Might it not be easily 

 done through the superintendents of chimney 

 sweepers? 



ON PROVIDING SCHOOLS FOR THE INSTRUC- 

 TIOIV OF farmers' SONS IN THE PHYSICAL, 

 SCIENCES. 



By Mr. William Hawkins, Hitchen, Hertfordshire 

 From the [British] Quarterly Journal of Agriculture. 



It is the object of this paper to recommend the 

 establishment of schools throughout the kingdom, 

 for teaching farmers' sons the elements of the 

 sciences; such, for example, as Chemistiy, Vege- 

 table Physiology, and Mechanics. And, in the 

 progress of it, I shall endeavor to show, first, the 

 usefulness of such knowledge, and then the me- 

 thod by which it may be generally diffused; and I 

 think I can make out both these points to the sat- 

 isfaction of any body who will take the trouble of 

 attending. 



To prove the importance of agriculture to a 

 community, seems very like demonstrating the 

 advantage of having food to eat and clothes to 

 wear. That it is indeed "the first and greatest 

 concern of every nation, and the foundation of its 

 prosperity in every other matter," is a truth so 

 universally acknowledged, that it has obtained 

 almost the currency of a proverb. But in spite of 

 this general recognition of its supremacy, a due 

 proportion of human ingenuity has never been di- 

 rected towards the investigation of its principles. 

 The mechanical arts have been earned to a high 

 degree of perfection by the labor and genius of 

 such men as Watt and Arkwright, and in every 

 town we see rising round us institutions for the 

 education of mechanics. But what, of a similar 

 nature, is being done for agriculture? We may 



look in vain for the institutions which should dif- 

 fuse among practical fanners even that knowledge 

 which already exists. The principles of agricul- 

 ture may have been explored by the genius of 

 Dav}', and its practice reformed by the labors of 

 Young, but discoveries and experiments can be 

 useful onlv as far as they are known. Mr. Ten- 

 nant has shown how the farmers in the neighbor- 

 hood of Doncaster might have told that there was 

 magnesia amongst their hme-stone. and that con- 

 sequently it would be injurious to the soil; that is 

 to say, he knew these things himself, but of Avhat 

 use were his experiments to the Doncaster fi\r- 

 mers, who never heard of them, nor perhaps of 

 him either? It is said that vaccination was known 

 in a district in Gloucestershire before the time of 

 Jenner, but how did that avail those who were 

 dying of the smalljiox in London? The barren- 

 ness of the hills in Westmoreland will be reme- 

 died, when, not the chemists and the vegetable 

 physiologists of London or Paris, but the tenants 

 and occupiers of those very hills shall understand 

 its causes and its cure. At present the means of 

 diffusing scientific knowledge amongst them are 

 extremely limited, and the general establishment 

 of agricultural schools would have for its object 

 the conveyance of knowledge to the place where 

 it is wanted, in a manner perfectly analogous to 

 the ingenious contrivances by which water is con- 

 veyed from the reservoir at Islington to the houses 

 of the inhabitants of London. 



But, it may be asked, shall chemists and recluse 

 philosophers presume to teach farmers how to 

 farm? Is it not to be supposed, that men who have 

 passed their whole lives in that pursuit, understand 

 it better than any body else? Most unquestiona- 

 bly they do. Sir Humphrey Davy would, most 

 likely, have made a bad farmer. There are a 

 thousand important considerations connected with 

 farming, of which he was probably ignorant; but 

 still he ascertained, in a manner clearer than had 

 been done before, the principles which regulate 

 the application of quicklime as a manure. And it 

 does so happen, that many of our useful discove- 

 ries have been owing to men not connected in 

 practice with the art to which their discoveries 

 were applicable. Arkwright Avas a barber, Dol- 

 lond was a silk-weaver. The compass, the chro- 

 nometer, and the weather-glass, three of the 

 greatest helps to navigation, were all discovered 

 by landsmen. Gunpowder is supposed to have 

 been first found out by a monk.* 



Put into another shape, the possibility of pro- 

 gressive improvement in agriculture may be a lit- 

 tle more palatable. The farmers in France obtain 

 from a soil at least as fertile as ours, no more than 

 18 bushels of wheat per acre on an average. la 

 this because they have less experience or less skill 

 and knowledge than ourselves? And if one of us 

 should undertake the thankless task of pointing 

 out to them their errors, he might count upon be- 

 ing laughed at for his pains, — lor presuming to 

 know better how to farm their lands than they who 

 had been at it for generations. 



Amongst the many helps towards a more per- 

 fect knowledge of external nature which the mind 



* " 'How came priests and bishops, and please your 

 honor, to trouble their heads so much about gunpow- 

 der?' 'God knows,' said my uncle Toby, 'his Provi- 

 dence brings good out of every thing.' " 



