

AND UPON WHEAT. 



209 



adding largely to the proportion of nitrogen contained in the 

 bulbs. According to what law this increase takes place, or 

 whether, as in the case before us, nitrogen in the form of am- 

 monia improves the quality more than it does in the form in 

 which it exists in rape-cake or other organic substances these 

 are points which can only be made out by further experimental 

 investigation. 



2. Experiments upon wheat. In 1844, Mr Lawes top-dressed 

 one portion of his wheat with superphosphate of lime and an- 

 other with ammoniacal salts, and in the dried grain reaped 

 from the two plots, he found the percentage of nitrogen to be, 

 from the 



Superphosphate of lime, 

 Ammoniacal salts, . 



3.03 per cent. 

 2.65 ,..* 



From which it would appear that the application of the ammo- 

 niacal manure had diminished instead of increasing the propor- 

 tion of nitrogen in the grain. 



Again, in 1846, he caused the percentage of nitrogen to be 

 determined in the grain reaped from experimental plots to 

 which he had applied respectively rape-cake, sulphate of am- 

 monia, and a mixture of the two. A general view of his 

 results is presented in the following table : 



Here, though the crop was increased not, however, in pro- 

 portion to the nitrogen applied the nutritive quality, as indi- 

 cated by the percentage of nitrogen, maybe considered to have 

 been sensibly the same throughout. The numbers show a slight 

 diminution of nitrogen in the rape-cake grain, and a slight 

 increase in that top-dressed with sulphate of ammonia, but the 



* See Royal Agricultural Journal) viii., p. 235 and 248. 







