690 Transactions of the American Institute. 



the requirements of the phmts that grew upon it ; but in this cla3' dis- 

 coveries in chemistry have become the basis of successful tilhige. Yet 

 farmers are no longer satisfied with tliis. They seek to go further, 

 and learn the origin of the lands they till, of the commercial fertili- 

 zers they use, tlie nature of the great changes in the earth's surface 

 that has formed the fields from whence their harvests come. They 

 would look back, guided by the light or scientific research, to the 

 rocks as they cooled when the world was young, and watch their 

 gradual disintegration and decay, the slow and softening action of 

 the elements upon them, their transport to their present resting 

 place by seas that subsided in remote ages, and their gradual disinte- 

 gration or solution into tillable and productive soils. Farmers are no 

 longer satisfied to simply know that marl is good for potatoes, but 

 wish as well to learn of its origin in the organic life of a period long 

 past. It follows from this that lectures like that of Prof. Cook are 

 becoming an important part of our agricultural literature ; they are, 

 as well, a forecast of the improved farming of the good time coming. 



Adjourned. 



February 8, 1870. 



ISTathak C. Ely, Esq., in the chair ; Mr. Jonx W. Chambees, Secretary. 

 Corn for Hogs. 



Mr, n. Cope, Short Creek, Ohio, wrote to inquire the comparative 

 value of old dry corn and corn fresh husked as food for hogs that 

 are being fattened. 



Mr. H. L. Keade said he had kept hogs for twelve mouths on old 

 corn, except during occasional times of scarcity, when he used new. 

 Without any positive information, he would be disposed to estimate 

 the difference as equal to ten per cent at least. 



Mr. Wm. Lawton thought that about the diiferencc in the quantity 

 <oi water contained in the two kin-ds. 



Dairy Farming in Orange County, N. Y. 

 Mr. Charles Singleton, Middletown, N. Y.— Dairy farming is 

 made a specialty, the farmers being stocked to their fullest capacity 

 with milch cows, by which system he says the land grows richer and 

 richer every year, and is therel)y capable of sustaining a itill larger 

 stock. Listead of being- manufactured at the farm-house, as formerly, 



