TO THE FARMER. 11 



with greatly increased quantities of air. This intima- 

 tion was sufficient for the manufacturer, and no long 

 time elapsed before he ascertained the specific condi- 

 tions under which this rapid conversion might be ac- 

 tually effected. Hence the chemical process, which 

 formerly lasted for weeks, nay, months, is now com- 

 pleted in as many hours, by the improved method of 

 acetification, and that, moreover, with far greater 

 certainty and perfection. May it not, then, be con- 

 sidered probable, that the practical agriculturist, even 

 if he should not attain more rapid, might yet achieve 

 more complete and sure results, if accurately ac- 

 quainted with the essential ingredients of the soil, as 

 also with those of the plants he might wish to culti- 

 vate thereon, and that, by this means, he might per- 

 haps raise advantageously one and the same kind of 

 crop successively upon the same field ? 



In the mineral kingdom there is found, although 

 extremely rare, a stone of so beautiful a blue color, 

 that the painter weighs its worth in gold, in order, 

 when triturated, to employ it in his art. A German 

 chemist analyzed it, and succeeded perfectly, more- 

 over, in reproducing it, with all its peculiar proper- 

 ties, from the constituent elements he found it to con- 

 tain. The magnificent artificial ultra-marine, now 

 met with in commerce, has thereby become so cheap, 

 that it is bought at scarcely the hundredth part of its 

 original price. Does not this fact appear to warrant 

 the conclusion, that we shall be able to prepare ma- 

 nures by artificial means, and at a reasonable cost, 



