144 ^ TREATISE ON THE CONNECTION OF 



FALLOWING. 



It lias been frequently noticed in the preceding pages, 

 that alkahne salts adl more powerfully on some kinds of 

 peat and inert vegetable matters than on others, particularly 

 on those which become oxygenated by being exposed to 

 -the adion of air. This points out, that the praficeof 

 fallowing ground containing much vegetable matl . f, by 

 repeatedly exposing fresh surfaces to the adlion of the 

 air, occasions the peat, or vegetable matter, to be more 

 easily dissolved, or atSted upon by alkaline salts ; but 

 -when no5Uch application is made, tlie insolubility of the 

 vegetable matter is by fallowing increased, which, to 

 certain grounds, may prove, instead of a benefit, a real 

 injury. 



'The putrefaction or solution of vegetable substances 

 IS more readily promoted by a close or stagnated state of 

 the air, than by a constant supply and addition of oxy- 

 gen or i)ure air, as happens to vegetable substances when 

 subjeded to the operation of fallowing. 



Clover, 



