66 ESSEX SOCIETY. 



acre, and raised seventy-five bushels. I have milked, this 

 year, four cows, and made, through June, July and August, 

 twenty-two pounds of butter per week. My orchard is all 

 young ; most of it has just commenced bearing. I have 

 raised this season, fifty bushels of market apples — Baldwins. 



Joseph Holt, Jr. 

 Andover, Nov. 16, 1852. 



Levi Bartletfs Letter. 



Warner, N. H., Dec. 3, 1852. 



Allen W. Dodge: — Dear Sir: The experiments of Pro- 

 fessor Way seem to throw much light upon some things con- 

 nected with agriculture, that were previously rather dark, and 

 not so easily comprehended. Still, I do not think Professor 

 Way's experiments, alone, fully explain the whole phenomena 

 of the fertility of naturally rich soils. We are, I think, equally 

 indebted to Liebig and Dr. Krocker, for an explanation of a 

 portion of the facts. Professor Way's experiments have proved. 

 Liebig made the discovery of the existence of ammonia in 

 rain water, and Dr. Krocker has, by his analysis, proved the 

 existence of a large amount of ammonia in the soil ; and Pro- 

 fessor Way has shown the capacity of the alluminous portions 

 of soils, for retaining — fixing, as it were, — the salts and gases, 

 so necessary in rendering a soil fertile. Says Professor Way, 

 this " is a very wonderful property of soil, and appears to be 

 an express provision of nature ; a power," he remarks, " is here 

 found to reside in soils, by virtue of which, not only is rain 

 unable to wash out of them those soluble ingredients forming 

 a necessary condition of vegetation ; but even these com- 

 pounds, when introduced artificially by manures, are laid hold 

 of and fixed in the soil, to the absolute preqlusion of amj loss^ 

 either hij rain or evaporation.^^ 



I must beg leave to be excused from going the ivhole figure 

 with him, in the above strong assertion. Take, for illustra- 

 tion, a strong clay soil, that has been thoroughly underdrained, 

 and then put upon it twenty-five loads per acre, of cattle ma- 

 nure from a barn cellar, spread and plough it in, let a heavy 

 rain follow, and I think the waters running from the drains 

 would show by their color, taste, and smell, that some of the 



