PREFACE. 



THIS treatise is by a farmer for farmers. Using forty 

 or fifty tons of commercial fertilizers on my own crops 

 annually, I have been compelled to " book myself up," as 

 the phrase is, to learn the cheapest market hi which to 

 buy the elements, the best way to combine these, and the 

 wisest way to apply them to the different crops of the farm. 

 This treatise is the result of the study of various works 

 on agricultural chemistry, especially the excellent reports 

 that have been sent out from our agricultural stations 

 by Professors. Johnson and Atwater, Goessmann, Dabney, 

 Caldwell, and others, to whom our sense of indebtedness 

 will be measured by the growth of our intelligence. This 

 study, combined with personal observation and experience, 

 makes up my little book. My treatise is not a work on 

 barn manure : it is confined, for the most part, to fertilizers. 

 It can perform no miracles : to ask that it shall show every 

 one the road to success in the profitable raising of his 

 crops would be as reasonable as was the search of the 

 alchemist of old for the wonderful alembic that was to 

 transmute every thing to gold. The whole matter of soil 



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