1S46.] Orange County Manures. 29 



itself — part is furnished by organized substances decaying in the 

 soil, and part comes from the atmosphere, taken up either by the 

 leaves as they spread out their broad surface to absorb it, or 

 washed down by the dews and rains, to be soaked up by the long, 

 fibrous roots that pierce every portion of the ground. Let us 

 examine the substances of which a plant consists — not by a mi- 

 nute analysis, but only to ascertain the different classes of sub- 

 stances, in order to find the source fi'om which they were origin- 

 ally derived. To do this, we need only burn the plant. By this 

 process the greater portion is dissipated — driven off into the at- 

 mosphere — but not lost, for we can collect it all and determine 

 what it is. The smaller portion remains in the form of a light 

 ash. This is unaffected by the fire — a portion of it only is solu- 

 ble in water, the greater part being earthy materials, and which 

 are evidently derived from the soil. The portion which has been 

 driven away by the heat, may have been obtained from water or 

 air, but this cannot come from such a source. The growing 

 plant has extracted it from the soil, and although each successive 

 crop does not take away the same amount, yet the quantity is a 

 constantly diminishing one, because there is every year less left 

 for the succeeding crop to take. Thus in process of time the soil 

 is exhausted of these materials. The same thing is true with 

 regard" to a considerable portion of those substances which were 

 dissipated by heat. They came from the soil, and are exhausted 

 from the soil by the same process. 



2. This analysis opens to us a second point ; a fertile soil con- 

 sists of two kinds of materials — the one, earthy — the other, form- 

 ed by the decay of animals and vegetables, in or upon the soil; 

 the first, called usually inorganic — the second organic. Both are 

 necessary to the healthy growth and perfection of a plant; but 

 the latter is usually found in very small quantities, and wherever it 

 predominates, or exists in large proportions, it is found injurious. 

 We should commit an enormous mistake, therefore, if we were to 

 infer, that because the earthy matter forms the smaller portion of 

 a plant, the same is the case with the soil. On the contrary, the 

 mineral part of the soil predominates largely in every fertile soil; 



