Nitrate of a bl e to grow beets, and especially beets rich in sugar, on 

 Soda for an y o ther kind of soil than light loam rich in humus, such 

 uga ' as we have in the Magdeburg district, on the northern 



8 border of the Harz, and in parts of Brunswick and Hildes- 



heim. But when later on land owners felt the need of 

 giving their acres a rest from beet-growing, they gradually 

 extended their beet cultivation to the lighter soils ; they 

 turned from the essentially loam soils first to the sandy 

 loams, then to the loamy, and lastly to the light sandy soils; 

 and, in fact, on these last, if they only possess the necessary 

 moisture and are properly manured, we succeed in growing 

 as good beets as on loam, so that we may say that the type 

 of soil suitable for growing beets is by no means a restricted 

 one, but that any even moderately useful agricultural land 

 appears to be suited for the cultivation of the crop. At 

 most we might exclude heavy clay soils, which are certainly 

 least adapted to the growth of the sugar-beet ; but, if the 

 necessary means are employed, even they may be rendered 

 suitable ; the means consisting mainly in the systematic 

 employment of lime to modify the heavy nature of the clay 

 soil so as to allow the beet to root deeply, to warm the soil, 

 and to render it readily workable. If this be done, sugar- 

 beet cultivation may be -profitably carried on even on the heaviest 

 clays. This has been proved in the most convincing 

 manner, and we therefore arrive at the conclusion that there 

 is, in fact, no kind of soil, with the exception of the driest 

 sand drifts, on which the sugar-beet may not be successfully 

 cultivated, if we only understand what are the measures 

 necessary to make it thrive. 



c , c .. If I now pass on to the third requisite for 



Sub-Soil. z. / . ; 



sugar-beet cultivation^ it urgently requires 



both a warm soil and a warm sub-soil. If we wish to define 

 what constitutes a cold soil, we understand by a cold soil 

 one in the sub-soil of which there is stagnant moisture, 

 water which has no outflow. The water causes coldness, 

 and cold is the greatest enemy of the sugar-beet, for it both 

 diminishes the quantity and injures the quality of the crop 

 in an incalculable degree. It is, in fact, correct to say of 

 such a soil that it is unsuitable for the cultivation of the 

 sugar-beet. But it must by no means be assumed that such 

 a soil is wholly and forever unfit because it is less suitable 

 than a soil with a warm, well drained sub-soil. 



