450 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



fault of the land, that I feel safe in asserting that, on an ex- 

 change of farms, the three-bushel farmer would, in a majority of 

 cases, bring the land whereon was raised the forty bushels of 

 rye, down to the average, in about the same time that the forty 

 bushel farmer would require to raise his bad bargain up to the 

 average. 



In order to grow maximum crops economically, many things 

 are necessary to be known, and many things to be done. I 

 shall take up these requirements, and do to each what justice 

 the limits of my time and your patience will permit. 



In entering on a farm, the first things that a judicious farmer 

 ought to ascertain are : the component parts of his soil and 

 subsoil, and of the crops that he proposes to raise. These last 

 may be learned from books ; but the other items of knowledge 

 must be obtained from an analysis of the soil ; and it would be 

 folly, as well as rank cowardice to deny, that the importance — 

 nay, the very value in the smallest degree — of soil analysis is 

 a matter now seriously questioned by some able men; as it is 

 also ignorantly ridiculed by many simple ones. 



That such knowledge is valuable and necessary, stands to 

 reason. For plants, like men, to grow, to live, must feed ; and 

 this sustenance must come from the earth, or from the air, or 

 from both. "What nourishment the air contributes is very 

 generally agreed upon ; and, the earth supplying the rest, it 

 becomes a matter of no little interest and importance to ascer- 

 tain the state of the larder. If chemistry, through an analysis 

 of soil, is not competent to this, we can not, otherwise, learn it. 



Again, soils oftentimes contain noxious ingredients that im- 

 pede the growth, or even affect the life of plants. These, when 

 ascertained, may be neutralized and made harmless; or, as 

 frequently happens, be rendered, in some other combinations, 

 positively beneficial to vegetation. 



The opposition of so many farmers to the application of 

 chemistry — a science capable of doing them so much good and 

 no harm — has ever been to me a matter of surprise. Let us 

 now consider the objections. 



The first objection raised against the value of soil analysis is : 

 That in so great a quantit}'', as is the soil, comparatively, it is 

 impossible to discover atoms so small as are many of the con- 



