GEINE. 75 



state IS influenced chiefly by the soil. There is the farmer's 

 true field of action. 



104. Differ as opinions may about the ultimate chemical 

 constitution, and the mode of action of geine, whether by 

 being taken up as a solution of geine, and of its compounds 

 with the earths and metals, called geine compounds, or only 

 as a source of carbonic acid, the great practical lesson of all 

 agricultural experience teaches that geine is essential to the 

 growth and perfection of seed, that without geine crops are 

 not raised. Geine is as essential to plants as is food to ani- 

 mals. So far as nourishment is derived from the soil, geine 

 is the food of plants. It may be laid down as the eighth 

 principle of agricultural chemistry, geine, in some form, is 



ESSENTIAL TO AGRICULTURE. 



105. In all its forms, it is agriculturally one and the same 

 thing. They are all included in the terms humus, or mould, 

 or geine. Geine, in its agricultural sense, is a generic term. 

 It includes all the decomposed organic matter of the soil. It 

 concerns the farmer less to know the ultimate chemical con- 

 stitution, than it does the practical, agricultural value of a 

 class of compounds termed geine. Restricting that term to 

 the definite compound which chemists have called humio 

 acid, an account of its relations will convey a full idea of 

 whatever other organic compounds are found in soil. 



In describing geine thus specifically, the properties of the 

 whole class are described under its generic name. 



106. It has been stated already, that geine is the product 

 of decomposition of bodies once endowed with life. For 

 the present purpose, it may be considered as the result of 

 vegetable decomposition. 



107. Life, and the manner how plants grow, may not be 

 understood. Growth is a living process. Decay is a chemi- 

 cal process. Its laws are not only understood, but its pro- 



