JOSIAH NEWHALL'S ADDRESS. 193 



and becomes resolved into its original elements, in this temperate 

 region the process is less rapid, and, in certain situations abound- 

 ing with water, the decomposing process is arrested, and peat 

 accumulates. In this situation, it abounds with acidity, and is 

 inert when applied as the food of plants. Within a few years, 

 peat lands were considered among the least valuable, having 

 been sold from five to ten dollars an acre, while their intrinsic 

 value is hundreds, nay thousands of dollars, for the purpose of 

 manure ; to say nothing of their value as an article of fuel, some 

 of which is but little inferior to coal. This substance, to be ren- 

 dered available in agriculture, should be dug in the autumn, and 

 exposed to the ameliorating influences of the atmosphere during 

 the severity of the winter. Farmers, having barn cellars, (and 

 none should be without,) will find, that, by using this material 

 largely under their stables, to absorb the liquid and mix with 

 the solid deposits of their animals, they may double or triple 

 the amount of their manure, and the quality will be far better 

 than that not protected from the wasting influence of the ele- 

 ments. The whole may be well mixed, and suifered to ferment 

 so far as to expel any remains of acidity, and the whole mass 

 becomes equally valuable for all thin and gravelly soils as clear 

 animal manure, and having a more permanent eflect. 



The intelligent farmer now regards the atmosphere as the 

 vast magazine and storehouse of those materials from which the 

 organic parts of all animal and vegetable life is, or has been, 

 derived. He sees by chemical light, the invisible carbonic acid 

 elaborated and assimilated to the different forms of being; and 

 he knows, that, from the soil, the inorganic portion of the veg- 

 etable frame is obtained. And, in the wondrous round of growth 

 and decay, he perceives that nothing is lost on the dissolution 

 of organized life. One portion returns to the earth, and the 

 other to the atmosphere in the form of gas, ready to enter into 

 new combinations of animal and vegetable life. Thus growth, 

 decay, and putrefaction, are but links in that endless chain of 

 motion which presents itself to view, and, in the language of 

 the poet : — 



" Look round the world ! behold the chain of love 

 Combining all below and all above. 

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