AND ITS RELATION TO ANIMAL LIFE 4! 



We thus get the same effect in the cane soils. 



Of course, it is a recognized fact in agricul- 

 ture that any crop will deteriorate the soil in 

 which it is grown, unless what it takes out is 

 put back in the form of manure. 



It is clear in both these cases that the 

 deficiency has not been made good, and conse- 

 quently that the plant has no longer the same 

 store of chemical constituents to draw upon 

 as when the land was first planted. It is only 

 reasonable to suppose that under such con- 

 ditions it will be deficient in some degree in 

 these constituents. An examination of a 

 series of analyses of food and other products 

 will clearly show that this is often the case, 

 and it may not be too strong a statement to 

 make, that faulty agriculture of this nature is 

 the rule rather than the exception, the sufferer 

 being first the farmer himself and secondly the 

 consumer. 



Taking first a crop of the utmost importance, 

 namely, wheat. 



In Watts' Dictionary of Chemistry you will 

 find the phosphoric acid in wheat varies be- 

 tween 14-5 and 60- 2, potash varies between 

 9*4 and 35-6, iron varies between 0*1 and 3*3 



