PRACTICAL FARMER GUIDED BY FACTS. 313 



adopted. The reason of their indifference about obtain- 

 ing proofs for their views chiefly consists in this, that 

 the practical man, like the artisan, is guided in his busi- 

 ness not by ideas, but by facts. Hence it is quite in- 

 different to him, whether the theory, or what he dig- 

 nifies by that name, is correct or not, as he does not 

 regulate his proceedings in accordance with it. 



Many thousand farmers, who have not the remotest 

 conception of the nutrition of plants or the composition 

 of manures, apply guano, bone earth, and other ma- 

 nures, to their fields, with fully the same effect and 

 with even the same skill as others who possess such in- 

 formation ; nor do the latter derive any manifest ad- 

 vantage from their knowledge, because it is not of the 

 right kind ; for example, the chemical analysis of ma- 

 nures is rather calculated for ascertaining their purity, 

 and for determining their price, than as a means for 

 making us acquainted with their effect upon land. 



In England bone earth w r as used and valued as a 

 manure half a century before any idea was formed as to 

 what its operation was due ; and when afterwards the 

 erroneous theory was adopted that its effect depended 

 upon the nitrogenous gelatine which it contained, this 

 view did not exert the slightest influence upon its em- 

 ployment. 



The farmer manured his field with bone earth, not 

 on account of its nitrogen, but because he wished to 

 have larger crops of corn and fodder, and because ex- 

 perience told him that he could not expect them with- 

 out bone earth. 



An agricultural practice, founded upon a simple ac- 

 quaintance with facts, without any idea of their nature, 

 or one based on the exhaustion of the land, may be con- 

 ducted by a person of very limited intelligence, nay, 

 the most ignorant man may be fitted for the purpose, 

 by the mere statement of facts to him. But a rational 

 pursuit of agriculture, which, with the greatest economy 

 of capital and labour, can obtain from a field continu- 

 ously without exhaustion the highest crops it is capable 

 of yielding, requires a large compass of knowledge, 



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