178 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



and all that you can increase beyond that depth will materially 

 aid in the growth and maturity of your crop. 



J. S. Brown, Chairman. 



MANURES. 



ESSEX. 



Report of the Committee. 



There is no subject of greater practical importance to the 

 agriculturists of New England than that of manures. Indeed 

 it is impossible to cultivate our soil successfully without under- 

 standing their importance, and learning the more economical 

 modes of preparing and applying them for the use of vegetation. 

 This is a subject of vast extent, requiring, for a full discussion, 

 great minuteness of detail, and for precise accuracy the frequent 

 use of chemical terms which cannot be fully understood by the 

 farmer unfamiliar with scientific knowledge, and I only propose, 

 in the brief space proper for this report, to submit some general 

 views upon the subject, avoiding the use of chemical terms, 

 aware that by such a course I shall be open to the charge of 

 want of exactness and precision. 



In order properly to understand the value and effects of 

 manures it is necessary to know how plants receive their food — 

 what there is in the original soil which alFords nutriment, and 

 what part each constituent of the same performs in the great 

 phenomena of vegetable life. 



The plant receives its entire nutriment through the pores in 

 its leaves and in the fibres of its roots, which are so minute as 

 not to be discernible by the naked eye. Consequently, every 

 thing that feeds it must be in either a liquid or aeriform state. 

 In no other condition can nutriment enter into the composition 

 of a plant. Through the leaves, it is supplied by the air aided 

 by the light and heat, with gases necessary for its support, and 

 from snows, rains, dews and evaporation, it is supplied with 

 moisture and nutritive substances in minute solution. So much 

 is received through this medium that some kinds of plants are 

 supplied almost entirely through their leaves. But important 



