quantities of various mineral substances were continued, and a series 

 of experiments were begun on the growth of plants in extracts of the 

 soils from the experimental plots. These latter trials have yielded 

 some very striking results, which are to be repeated and extended in 

 the coming year. Another series of experiments dealt with the 

 growth of plants in nutritive solutions of various concentrations, 

 either as water cultures or with the nutritive solution added to sand 

 so as to keep the sand moist but not wet. In all cases growth was 

 found to be proportional to the concentration of the solution, even 

 though the solutions were regularly renewed and always provided 

 the plant with an excess of nutrients. It was also found that 

 the soluble nutrients could dififuse with perfect freedom along the 

 thin water films coating the grains of sand, and that there was no 

 retardation of growth even when the nutrients were enclosed in 

 porous pots inside the sand, so that they were forced to travel by 

 diffusion before they could reach the plant's roots. Further 

 experiments on this subject are projected for the coming year. 



Dr. Brenchley resumed her study of the weeds of arable land, 

 taking this time a district on the borders of North West Wiltshire 

 and Somerset, which gave her a range of formations including some 

 of those that were dealt with in her work of 1911 on the soils of 

 South Bedfordshire. It is interesting to find that the association of 

 particular weeds with particular soils which prevailed in South 

 Bedfordshire did not always hold for the same formations and weeds 

 in the new district. Dr. Brenchley's second paper dealing with her 

 1912 work is now going through the press. 



During the year the Board of Agriculture has published the 

 Report on the Agriculture and Soils of Kent, Surrey and Sussex carried 

 out by Dr. Russell and myself. The Report forms a book of 206 

 pages with 56 maps and plates, and gives the analyses, mechanical 

 and chemical, of 124 soils with their subsoils, derived from 14 

 formations. The report contains an account with some historical 

 notes of the agriculture and rural industries of the district, illustrated 

 by a series of maps showing the distribution of crops. The 

 dependence of this distribution upon the character of the soils and 

 the rainfall is discussed, and recommendations are made as to the 

 systems of manuring,seed mixtures, etc., appropriate to each formation. 



A more elaborate study of the fatting and non-fatting pastures 

 of Romney Marsh has been brought to a conclusion, and a paper on 

 the subject is now ready for the press. No very pronounced 

 difference could be found between either soils or the herbage of the 

 two pastures. The difference, w^hich is very real in practice, seems 

 to be due to an accumulation of small causes acting over a long 



