I 



TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION B. 507 



FRIDAY, AUGUST 27. 



The President delivered the following Address : — 



Some of my predecessors in this Chair, whose duties as teachers of chemistry lead 

 them to traverse a wide range of the subject every year, have appropriately and 

 usefully presented to the Section a resume of the then recent progress in the mani- 

 fold branches of the science which have now such far-reaching ramifications. Such 

 a course has, however, come to be of much less importance and interest of late years, 

 since the systematic publication by the Chemical Society of abstracts of chemical 

 papers in liome and foreign journals as soon as possible after their appearance. 

 Some, on the other hand, have confined attention to a department with which 

 their own inquiries have more specially connected them. And, when the Council 

 of the Association request a specialist like m5'self to undertake the. Presidency of 

 the Section, it is to be supposed they take it for granted that he wiU select for his 

 opening address some branch of the subject with which he is known to be mainly 

 associated. 



But it seems to me that there is a special reason why I should bring the subject 

 of Agricultural Chemistry before you on the present occasion. Not only is the 

 application of chemistry to agriculture included in the title of this Section ; but in 

 18ii7 the Committee of the Section requested the late Baron Liebig to prepare a 

 report upon the then condition of Organic Chemistrj', and it is now exactly forty 

 years since Liebig presented to the British Association the first part of his report, 

 which was entitled ' Organic Chemistry in its Application to Agriculture and Physi- 

 ology ; ' and the second part was presented two years later, in 1842, under the title 

 of ' AnimalChemistry, or Organic Chemistry in its application to Physiology and 

 Pathology.'. Yet, so far as I am aware, no President of the Section has, from that 

 time to the present, taken as the subject of his address the Application of Chemistry 

 to Agi'icidture. 



Appropriate as, for these reasons, it would seem that I, who have devoted a very 

 large portion of the interval since the publication of Liebig's works, above referred 

 to, to agricultural inquiries, should occupy the short time that can be devoted to 

 such a purpose in attempting to note progress on that important subject, it will be 

 readily understood that it would be quite impossible to condense into the limits of 

 an hour's discourse anything approaching to an adequate account, either of the 

 progress made during the last forty years, or of the existing condition of agricultural 

 chemistry. 



For what is agricultural chemistry ? It is the chemistry of the atmosphere ; 

 the chemistry of the soil ; the chemistry of vegetation ; and the chemistry of 

 animal life and growth. And but a very imperfect indication of the amount of 

 labour which has been devoted of recent years to the investigation of these various 

 branches of what might at first sight seem a limited subject will sufiice to convince 

 you how hopeless a task it would be to seek to do more than direct attention to a 

 few points of special interest. Indeed, devoting to the purpose such leisure as I have 

 been able to command, the more I have attempted to become acquainted with the 

 vast literature which has been accumulated on the subject, the more difficulty have 

 I felt in making a selection of illustrations which should not convey an idea of the 

 limits, rather than of the extent, of the labour which has been expended, and of the 

 results which have been attained, in agricultural research. 



The works of Liebig to which I have referred have, as you all know, been the 

 subject of a very great deal of controversy. Agricultural chemists, vegetable 

 physiologists, and animal physiologists have each vehemently opposed some of the 

 conclusions of the author, bearing upon their respective branches. But if the part 

 which has fallen to my own lot in these discussions qualifies me at all to speak for 

 others as well as myself, I would say that those who, having themselves carefully 

 investigated the points in question, have the most prominently dissented from anj' 



