Outlines of Horticultural Chemistry. 127 



among the west of Yorkshire clothiers, originally sprang up 

 from imitation of one or two amateurs of each pursuit ; and 

 there only needs a similar^^/,s^ impulse^ which a society with a 

 few thousands a year might give, to spread a general taste for 

 music, singing, and dancing, and ultimately for other branches 

 of the fine arts, as drawing and painting, as well as for natural 

 history and the cultivation of flowers and fruits, &c. 



The lower classes in England, thus improved in morals and 

 manners by a better education and more humanising amuse- 

 ments, might be safely left to choose their time of contracting 

 marriage, and would then no more make beasts of themselves 

 by drinking fermented liquors, than do the lower classes in 

 the city from which I write, where probably more beer (and 

 that by no means weak) is drank than in any town of similar 

 size in England, every street being crowded with cabarets 

 (public-houses), and these in the evening almost always filled. 

 But how filled ? Not with rioters and noisy drunkards, but 

 with parties at separate tables, often consisting of a man, his 

 wife and children, all sipping their pot of beer poured into 

 very small glasses to prolong the pleasure, and the gratifica- 

 tion of drinking seeminfj less than that of the cheerful chit- 

 chat, which is the main object of the whole assemblage. 

 Deep-rooted national bad habits can be eradicated only by the 

 spread of knowledge, which will ultimately teach our lower 

 classes, as it has already done the bulk of the higher, that 

 moderation is the condition of real enjoyments, and must be 

 the motto even of the sensualist who aims at long-continued 

 indulgence. I am Sir, yours, &c. 



Brussels, Feb. 26. 1 829. William Spence, 



Art. III. Outlines of Horticultural Chemistry. By G. W. Johnson, 

 Esq., Great Totham, Essex. 



{^Continued from p. 323.) 



If kept perfectly dry, seeds will never vegetate. They re- 

 quire, therefore, some kind of moisture, and that moisture must 

 be supplied by "uoater. I have kept beans and peas moistened 

 by olive oil and alcohol only, but otherwise under circum- 

 stances favourable to vegetation, without their showing the 

 least symptom of germinating. Water, then, is an essential ; 

 the most appropriate quantity varies with the species of plant. 

 If in excess it is more prejudicial than a total deficiency, since 

 in the first case it excites decay, in the latter event the seed 



