I, i B K A K V 



UNIVERSITY OF 



CALIFORNIA. 



>^_.. v 



CHEMICAL MANURES. 



A TRANSLATION OF AGRICULTURAL LECTURES GIVEN BY 

 GEORGE* VILLE, IN 1867, AT THE EXPERIMENTAL FARM OF 

 VINCENNES. 



LECTURE FIRST. 



HENTLEMEN : Since 1861 I have been in the habit of giving in 

 \JT a series of lectures the results of my studies on the means of 

 husbanding and increasing the fertility of the soil, outside of those 

 traditions consecrated by the experience of the past. My method 

 belongs essentially to science, both in character and origin. From 

 the beginning it has been conceived in the hope of giving a guide to 

 Practice upon which she can safely rely. My efforts have been 

 directed to freeing it as much as possible from all theoretic formulae 

 which are not imposed by the nature of the subject. 



Since commercial liberty has become the economy of nations, we 

 feel with added force the importance of agricultural questions. 

 Under this new rule a nation can have a sound prosperity, but in 

 proportion as it surpasses those nations to whom its interior is thrown 

 open, it must produce more and more cheaply. 



By what process can we obtain this end ? 



We will now seek it together, building upon the facts to which I 

 here bear witness. Entering on my subject under its new aspect 

 carries my thoughts back, and not without emotion, to the time when 

 my labors were first thought worthy of encouragement by his gracious 

 Majesty. Many doubted the results, as my efforts were founded on 

 the studies of the laboratory. The emperor thought differently, and 

 the founding of the experimental farm at Vincennes is an additional 

 proof of the enlightened solicitude of our sovereign for our agricul- 

 tural interests. 



As I have already said, our Agriculture must increase her products 

 if she would reduce their cost. The laws which permit her so to do 

 require me to begin with the most intricate problems of vegetation 

 in a word, to unveil to you the very elements of which plants are 

 composed, since it is to these she must have recourse if she would 

 increase her returns. 



In the composition of plants nothing is permanent. Their ele- 

 ments experience, in different organs, certain movements, veritable 

 migrations, whose order and succession are regulated by fixed laws. 



