PROCEEDINGS OF THE FARMERS* CLUB. 41t 



Now the truth, I think, lies between these theories. If you 

 place upon a table four or five tumblers, and put an ounce of soil 

 in each — then let the 1st tumbler receive nothing but water ; 

 tumbler No. 2, water with a drop of ammonia ; tumbler No. 3, 

 water, a drop of ammonia and a small quantity of common salt; 

 tumbler No. 4, all these things, and a stream of carbonic acid 

 running into the soil ; tumbler No. 5, all these other things, with 

 the root of a growing plant hung over and into the water, (intro- 

 duced from a flower-pot beside it) and you then make an analysis 

 of the contents of each. After a fortnight you will find in tum- 

 bler No. 1 nothing new ; in tumbler No. 2 one portion of inor- 

 ganic matter in solution ; in No. 3 five do ; in No. 4 twenty do ; 

 and in No. 5 one hundred ; that is one hundred times as much 

 inorganic matter as in No. 2. 



You will therefore perceive that water mingled with ammonia 

 has its power as a solvent of inorganic matter increased. There- 

 fore, we find in under drained and sub-soiled land, a large amount 

 of moisture condensed from the atmosphere, and of course a cor- 

 responding increase of ammonia. 



I tried last year upon alternate strips of beets, celery and 

 other crops, crystallized sulphate of ammonia in various quanti- 

 ties, leaving other strips between them without it. I should 

 state to you that the soil upon which I experimented has been 

 for many years thoroughly underdrained, and it is fairly charged 

 with the inorganic constituents of plants in a progressed shape, 

 but I could make no impression upon that soil in the increase of 

 crops, by the use of ammonia. We all know that water falling 

 through the atmosphere takes up carbonic acid gas and ammonia. 

 The first half pint of Avater that falls from a roof at the begin- 

 ning of a shower will be found filled with noxious gases ; not the 

 washings from the roof alone, but the washings from the atmos- 

 phere; and many persons have till-basins to catch this foul 

 water. We all know, also, when the atmosphere comes in con- 

 tact with anything colder than itself it deposits moisture, as is 

 the case in thoroughly under drained lands. In such soils every 

 drop of water so condensed must be replete with ammonia, pre- 

 cisely like the first pint of water falling upon the roof. The 

 atmosphere is the grand vehicle in which all the decay from the 

 surface of nature is held and carried about. The atmosphere, 

 also, always contains moisture. There is the same amount of 



[Am. Inst.] AA 



