62 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



1840 that Licbig announced propositions that opened a new 

 world of thought and study, and awakened the attention of 

 intelligent formers to the importance of applying the results 

 of chemical investigations, and, in some respects, essentially 

 modified the practice of all civilized countries. 



They were simple words to lead to such results: — "To 

 manure an acre of land with forty pounds of bone-dust," 

 said he, " is sufficient to supply three crops of wheat, clover, 

 potatoes, turnips, etc., with phosphates; but the form in 

 which they are restored to the soil does not appear to be a 

 matter of indifference ; for the more finely the bones are 

 reduced to powder, and the more intimately they are mixed 

 with the soil, the more easily they are assimilated. The 

 most easy and practical mode of effecting their division is to 

 pour over the bones, in the state of fine powder, half of their 

 weight of sulphuric acid, diluted with three or four parts of 

 water." Simple words, and yet they opened the way to the 

 whole system of concentrated fertilizers, which has extended 

 so far in modern times and grown to such gigantic propor- 

 tions as to affect the commerce of the whole civilized world. 



Guano, to be sure, had first been brought to public notice 

 by Baron Humboldt and by Sir H. Davy, but it was not till 

 the researches set on foot by the revelations of Liebig that it 

 was at all used in England. Twenty casks were landed 

 there in 1840, and so great was the confidence in its use, as a 

 means of renovating the soil and increasing the products of 

 the country, that the importation increased to 2,000 tons in 

 1841, and to over 200,000 in 1845, the English trade alone 

 employing, in that year, 679 vessels. In less than sixteen 

 years from 1840 the quantity taken from the Chincha Islands 

 alone reached the enormous figure of 2,000,000 tons, and the 

 amount of sales in that time was over $100,000,000. 



This precious fertilizer soon came to be extensively used in 

 this country. In 1848, Ave imported over 1,000 tons; in 

 1849, over 21,000 tons; in the ten years previous to 1860 

 the quantity is reported at 842,787 tons. It is stated that in 

 the ten years previous to 1870 the quantity imported was 

 387,585 tons, valued at about $6,000,000. But these figures 

 give but a feeble idea of the extent to which special and con- 

 centrated fertilizers now enter into our agriculture, for many 



