of Central Somerset. 17 



much less chloride of potassium occur than in the hay from 

 scouring-land. If the potassium in the chloride is calculated as 

 potash, and this is added to the potash which exists in the ash 

 principally as silicate, the total quantity of potash in the ash of 

 the hay from peaty land will be found to amount to 2 6 '30 per 

 cent., and that of the hay from scouring-land to 36 '33 per cent. 

 Again, the percentage of chlorine in the chlorides of these two 

 ashes differs greatly; in^the one it amounts to 13*42 per cent., 

 and in the other to only 9 '32 per cent. We thus find a much 

 larger proportion of potash salts and less silica in scouring hay 

 than in sweet hay from peaty land. 



3. The proportion of nitrogenized compounds in sound hay is 

 smaller than that of hay from scouring land. Thus in the hay 

 from peaty land we have not quite 9 per cent, of these com- 

 pounds, and in one sample of hay from scouring land at Meare 

 rather more than 11 per cent., and in the second as much as 

 14J per cent, of nitrogenized compounds. 



The preceding analytical results therefore show that the or- 

 ganic portion as well as the mineral part of sound and scouring 

 hay materially differ from each other in composition, and I have 

 no doubt that other differences would have been brought to light 

 had the organic portion of hay been more fully examined. I 

 have confined myself to the determination of nitrogen in the hay, 

 because its proportion in vegetable produce affords an excellent 

 indication of its state of maturity, and a more complete organic 

 analysis should be undertaken with the fresh and not with the 

 dried produce. 



Not many years ago a high percentage of nitrogen in hay, 

 turnips, mangolds, and other kinds of agricultural produce was 

 regarded as a proof of their superior nutritive value ; but a 

 thorough investigation which I undertook on account of the fre- 

 quent discrepancies in the calculated theoretical nutritive value 

 of various articles of food, and the value assigned to them by 

 practical men, has shown me that the higher proportion of 

 nitrogen in one of two samples of hay, turnips, mangolds, c., by 

 no means indicates a higher feeding-value, but the very reverse. 

 I have been actively engaged for more than three years with an 

 inquiry into the changes which roots undergo in their various 

 stages of growth, and especially when they approach maturity. 

 In connection with this inquiry a great many collateral experi- 

 ments were instituted, to which reference cannot be made in this 

 place. Some of the results, however, have so direct a relation to 

 the subject of this report, that I cannot refrain from stating some 

 of the principal. 



