No. 149] 481 



alumnia and one per cent of carbon. The fluid manures of the 

 barn yard, if poured on these barrels of sand, will pass through 

 the one filled with simple sand unaltered, while that passing 

 through the other barrel will be deodorized and limpid water 

 only will pass through, free from ammonia and the alkalies. 

 This fact accounts for the purity of water in wells, for without 

 these effects in the soil, wells would contain a saturated solution 

 containing all the soluble results of decayed nature. 



Meadows sometimes run out in a few years, but in well sub- 

 soiled and underdrained lands this never takes place, as the 

 roots cannot meet (in soils so prepared) with hard subsoils not 

 disintegrated, and it is only under such circumstances that roots 

 cease to tiller. 



Air passing through disintegrated soils deposits ammonia and 

 moisture, and thus secures against drought. Plants cannot be 

 supported by additions of inorganic manures only, and thus the 

 manures of Liebig, composed of the materials found in the ashes 

 of plants, failed, not because they were not wanted, but because 

 a portion of organic matter must also be present in the soil to 

 enable it to receive and retain the required additions from the 

 atmosphere. 



Hair is of great value to the celery crop. When the plants 

 are pulled up for use, you will see some of the hair always at- 

 tached to their roots. The hair furnishes the albumen wanted 

 by this plant. I put in the compost heap spent tan, leather chips, 

 salt and lime ; mix all perfectly, and in about sixty days I find 

 the leather chips converted to a brown powder, and the tan fit 

 for manure. Inorganic substances will not alone raise plants. 

 Clover derives nine-tenths of its supplies from the atmosphere, 

 from which it sends off the oxygen. Raise clover in a pot, and it 

 takes from the air more in weight than the soil in the pot. The 

 sand of Middlesex, Jersey, mixed well with muck and other 

 manures, becomes a magazine to receive the ammonia and carbon 

 from the air. 



The construction and the use of tiles proper for underdraining 

 is a very important matter, not more for low than for high fields. 



[Assembly No. 149.] FF 



