142 MASSACHUSETTS HOETICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



and it would seem that the land should have been growing better, 

 but it did not. Prof. Stockbridge would say that he had not put 

 In the proper substances, but if we take away seventy bushels 

 after applying only the necessarj^ food for fifty bushels, it would 

 seem strange that the soil should continue to grow better. 



One of the worst things about these fertilizers was the patent, 

 and it could not be denied that the Agricultural College had indi- 

 rectly endorsed it. The speaker had the success of the college 

 much at heart, but it is not what it should be, and some of the 

 greatest injuries it has received have been at the hands of its 

 friends. Prof. Stockbridge, while in the service of the Agricultu- 

 ral College, has made experiments, for the results of which he 

 takes out a patent. 



H. Weld Fuller said that he knew very little about the Stock- 

 bridge fertilizers, but he was a friend to fertilizers properly used ; 

 yet it appeared to him that there is a fallacy in these formulas. 

 They assume that all soils are alike, and are to be dosed alike for 

 the same result. The}?^ presume too, that the product will be just 

 in proportion to the fertilizers added. Now we know that soils 

 are not all alike ; that each soil has its own power of absorbing, 

 elaborating, and assimilating its food, and that the product is not 

 alwa3^s in proportion to the fertilizer. The plant therefore should 

 be supplied with the food which it needs for its special service. 

 Its growth is restricted to the mimnium of any one of its constitu- 

 ents. Any excess of other materials will not add to the product, 

 but may often do harm. We have long known what are the elements 

 of our different crops. Corn, cotton, potatoes, and tobacco have 

 been analysed a thousand times, and Liebig, Johnston, and several 

 others have told us what there is in oats, peas, beans, and barley ; 

 but who has told us just what our own particular soil contains, 

 and its power of absorbing and appropriating what we supply? 

 There, probably, is never any lack of nitrogen, for the air and 

 earth are full of it ; nor is carbon lacking — air, rain and dew, and 

 the processes of nature keep up an inexhaustible amount. Some 

 soils, however, cannot make it energetic, and even an inferior ma- 

 terial may increase the action in the soil ; yet here we have a set 

 formula to apply to every soil. By it you may add what you have 

 already in abundance or excess. If I owe a hundred dollars and 

 know that I have fifty dollars, it is a fair deduction that fifty are 

 wanted. But if I have a hundred dollars to pay, and know noth- 



