394 



THE AGRICULTURAL GAZETTE 



farm in* business are varied if not relieved by a^of it from the volume lately published in answer to 

 livelier insight into the why and wherefore of Mr. Lawes, 



and an awakening interest in the inner 



Still it is slow ; 



things, __ 



history and philosophy of the art. 

 slow to the eye that counts with eagerness years 

 that roll with speed, and indulges the ever too 

 sanguine expectation of seeing Discovery and its 

 Consequence so far at least contemporaneous in 

 generation, as parent and child walking hand in 

 hand, and not separated by a gulf too broad for 

 prescience to see across, or for hope to span. 



Never was there a moment when a little, and 

 even a very little cultivation of the chemistry of 

 farming would be more pleasantly and amply re- 

 warded than the present : for, never was a subject 

 of more everyday interest to the practical man 

 handled in the lists of science, or between cham- 

 pions better qualified for the task, than in the con- 

 troversy now waging and at its height between — let 



--*--* ^ Not at Vienna or 



It will be in the memory of many of our readers 



No world- 



us say England and Germany. 



Berlin! Thank Heaven for that. 



shaming Christian slaughter roars and howls out 

 o'doors a running accompaniment of blood and 

 broken bones to the ' polite pauses ' of our ' Con- 

 ference/ The nitrates and sulphates we talk cf 

 don't mean Gunpowder, nor do our hottest dis- 

 putes involve any such extra-super-phosphate as 

 that which saturates the soil of the Crimean 

 peninsula. Some sharp phrases and stinging words, 

 there be ; just enough to make men of science stare, 

 and wonder, and rouse themselves to the recollec- 

 tion that it is war-time ; but the chemistry of our 

 profession with all its heat and transmutations 

 keeps no laboratory for the manufacture of father- 

 less children and widows, and in the trenches it digs 

 and defends, and the ground it gains from the foe, 

 not even a tear bedews the furrow. 



So, hoping for quieter times, let us return to the 

 'soil and the atmosphere/ and to the particular 

 question on the nutrition of plants which has 

 called forth, and is still calling forth such brisk 

 reply and rejoinder between the advocate and the 

 opponent of the i so-called' (and, as far as we can 

 see, properly so-called) " Mineral Theory." 



We shall attempt, at all risk of apparent in- 

 adequacy of language, to reduce this question to its 

 very simplest terms, to disrobe it down to its 

 commonest dress; a fate that surely enough awaits 

 it, as it becomes more talked of, and better known ; 

 and which, if it be true that contraries beget each 

 other, no question ever better deserved ; darkened 

 as it has been by an involution and prolixity of 

 language, that might be almost intended to hide all 

 meaning from the common world. 



Certainly to those who read the first translation 

 of the Works of Baron Liebig that appeared in this 

 country, the doctrine of that distinguished writer 

 appeared to be plainly and distinctively this : that 

 the analysis of the ashes of a plant, disclosing as 

 they do its mineral constituents, afforded the 

 formula, so to speak, of its specific manure : that 

 in these lay as it were the skeleton of its structure 

 its earthy and earth-derived part. That the organic 

 portion of its composition, obtained chiefly from the 

 carbonic acid and ammonia of the atmosphere, and 

 returned thereto by combustion, not being limited 

 m quantity as the mineral constituents are, bv the 

 nature of the soil, but existing within reach 

 ot the roots and the leaves of the plant, and 



m unlimited amount; the conclu- 

 deduced was that the 



to the latter 

 sion plainly 

 to the soil 



carried 

 object of 



. restoration 



e mmeral constituents 

 oft by the crop was the true aim and 



manure; and that every addition of these enabled 

 the plant to take up a proportionately larger 

 dose of organic food, and in a shorter space of time- 

 ttius answering in every way the special object of 



of 



the farmer. 



In the case 



phates, sulphates, 



mineral elements 

 straw 



Wheat, for instance, the phos- 

 silicate of potash, and other 

 of its structure, in grain and 

 would be, according to this principle, the 

 proper components of its specific manure : and so 

 of every other plant in Jike manner. It was not 

 said, that additional supplies of ammonia and car- 

 bomc i acid to those obtainable from natural sources, 

 would be useless or inoperative, but that their 

 St 11 ^ the P lant wou]d entirely depend 

 2TS» Ki gTee in which the mineral elements were 

 ftat ^% ln . eq ] livaIent P r <>P°rtionin the soil. So 



sJ^iiT^ the former ciass (*° ch 



as 



exhausting the 

 these should 



mineral 

 be 



' equivalents,' and so far 

 rem*ininrr *« ™_ deficient, or not available, 



IwZ , S,"*. D Sir* , ™» productive of .„,' 



This we believe to be a not unfair, though it may 

 be a very inadequate statement if the T m inTS 

 tteory, as conveyed in Liebxg's former work no 

 can we gather any material aualifW;™ Z "JZL* ? or 



that this ' Theory ' had a sort of counter-reflection 

 out-of-doors in public opinion for several years. 

 Farmers of the elderly school, on the one hand, 

 denounced the newly-introduced 'artificial' manures 

 as 'mere stimulants/ 'exhausters of the soil'; and 

 distrusted the use of dressings that yielded up all 

 their virtue to a single crop ; while authorities of 

 the more scientific school were advising the appli- 

 cation of guano (then regarded, erroneously enough, 

 as the type of the ' artificials ') to the Turnip-crop, 

 and not to the cereals. 



The experiments carried on at Rothamsted, and 

 the doctrine deduced from them by Mr. Lawes, led 

 him to conclusions very different from those on 

 which Baron Liebig's theory had been constructed, 

 and which had been carried into trial upon a sand- 

 pit at Giessen. " Previous experiments, which I 

 had made in my garden in the town," says Likbig, 

 " had yielded no result. This induced me to pur- 

 chase the land alluded to, a Sand-pit to the east of 

 the town, which I forJnd to surpass all others, in its 

 nearly complete barrenness for the ordinary culti- 

 vated crops. I do not believe that, in a whole 

 year, there grew naturally on the whole ten acres 

 as much Grass or other fodder as would have 

 sufficied for a single sheep. The land, therefore, 

 was of the quality adapted to the object I had in 

 view." 



We fear this would be an inauspicious opening of 

 the Baron's case before a jury of English farmers. 

 But it is impossible to pass over ground so important 

 to the question at issue as that on which the experi- 

 ments are respectively tried, on both sides. 



What was the 'object in view'? Was it to 

 prove that the mineral constituents of plants were the 

 first essential of their growth upon an area (a soil you 

 cannot say) entirely barren of them ? If so the spot 

 was well chosen, e.g.— To prove that the mineral 

 parts of their structure, and not theammoniacaland 

 carbonaceous, are the proper manure of plants, take 

 a piece of ground in which the former are totally 

 wanting, and where the atmosphere will supply the 

 latter ! '" rW; 



What 



agn- 

 in an 



But, surely, this was not the object, 

 culture wanted to know was whether 

 ordinarily constituted soil, poor, — not by original 

 denial of everything but " sand and quartz pebbles," 

 but by the common infirmity of over-cropping, — 

 the growth/ of cereal crops, whose scanty foliage 

 derives less than others from the atmosphere, would 

 be best promoted by mineral, or by nitrogenous 

 applications to their roots. 



Now, on this question, Baron Liebig furnishes us 

 in his last work (p. 55) with the following con- 

 densed^ statement of his meaning, viz., "that 

 ammoniacal salts alone have no effect; that, in 

 order to be efficacious, they must be accompanied 

 by the mineral constituents, and that the effect is 

 then proportional to the supply— not of ammonia, 

 but of the mineral substances:' 



In the following page we have the counter-state- 

 ment (given by Liebig) of the conclusion drawn 



by Mr. Lawes from his experiments on Wheat as 

 follows. 



fi 



5/ Wheat 





2. That the produce, & _ m wv _ 



proportional to the supply" of ammonia. ' ' ■ 



This is a clear issue. Now let us look at the 

 land on which Mr. Lawes' experiments were made. 



A field of 14 acres was divided into equal por- 

 tions, of which one was without any manure what- 

 ever : one manured annually with 14 tons of stable- 

 dung ; the rest with different artificial manures, in 

 various mixtures, viz., bone earth, bones with sul- 

 phuric acid, phosphate of magnesia, phosphate of 

 soda, phosphate of potash, silicate of potash, and 

 Liebig's mineral manure.' 



The result of seven years' experiments was that 

 the lot manured with stable-dung yielded one half 

 more than the unmanured lot ; which, however 

 produced as much as either of those with the 

 artificial (mineral) manures, except that which had 



Liebig s manure,' on which there was an increase 

 of about 3 bushels of grain and 2 cwt. of straw ; 



a result/ says Liebig, "which Mr. Lawes is 

 inclined to ascribe to the presence of a small quan- 

 tity of ammonia in this manure, which he says he 

 azstinctly perceived by its smell." 



Probably, Baron Liebig, not being himself the 

 manufacturer, was not in a position to contradict 

 th ls , from personal knowledge. It is not contra- 

 dicted ; and it is important. For ourselves mean- 

 while, we perfectly believe the tale told by the 

 sand-pit at Gie*sen and have entire faith in the 

 seven-years chronicle of the fourteen-acre-piece at 

 Kothamsted ; and we hope, shortly, to exemplify, 



with their help, the logical 

 is a wide difference betwei 

 tradictories.'' II. 



■ 



some very difficult drainage to execute 



on 



EXPERIENCES IN LAND DRAIVirr 

 No. XIV.-Result satisfactory, ** * AGE ' 

 exceptions, where much oxide of iron exilT* ^ 

 drainage generally, but following as much « ^ 

 the declination of land.- Four feT (rn £ **"* 

 Drains on Grass lands a little further apart-! 

 fall ; laud laid as flat as possible, removing m 

 furrow Full-sized 2-inch pipes used for iJJL 

 13 to 8-mch mams ; collars ,„ bog and unsound^ 

 —1 have not kept a.r venis permanently open UjZ 

 uncovered for months.— Perhaps 12 acres rani, 

 one outfall, but this is altogether dependent onllS 

 ground, allowing more than an inch for outlet si 

 —clay, gravel and peat, clay and grarel.-Roci 

 and limestone ; Newbrough lime and freeston* Hum* 

 450 feet ; Newbrough is 350 feet (or thereabout^ k 

 fall 25 to 30 inches ; Newbrough 20 inches.- 1 bTvehS 



•tghftflt 



™ .... , v ^ w „^^„ „j „««. ui care ana time • pro. 

 ceeding step by step, allowing months to tlap* betw** 

 each successive " spading." In some instance* tfata 

 has been an average fall of surface of 3 or 4 feet 

 extent of 30 or 40 acres ; and in spots where the levd 

 has subsided into "basins" (the great danger to bt 

 apprehended and guarded against in rapid execution 

 similar works), has been much greater ; on one cot- 

 siderable portion the drains were bled off, and kept opa 

 upwards of a year ; on another double that time beta* 

 they could be safely laid and closed. Two to S-fert 

 drains were, at 50 yards apart, quite effective, when tb 

 peat was black and fully decomposed. When .he bm 

 consists of partially decayed Mosses, &c. (which I have 

 found to be the case to the depth of 3 or 4 feet), it a 

 more difficult and expensive to cut than stiff and atopy 

 clay and gravel, aud M draws" very badly ; of com 

 collars were used even with 4-inch pipes. It would kt 



a great advantage were the Drainage Comroiai . 



empowered to authorise limeing and soiling bogs. Til 

 only serious difficulty I have experienced iD draiiflf 

 operations, is dealing with water charged with oxide i 

 iron ; I have known 3-inch pipes to be choked in Ml 

 year by it, and this where there was a considerable iff 

 of water. Where much lime is held in solution, it fi 

 sooner or later ruin the drain. In one instance I foM 

 pipes laid in open gravel stopped at the end of 3 j 

 by small fibrous roots, in meadow land, depth 4 feet; 

 no collars. After some years' experience I have 

 doubt as to the comparative inutility of shallow dnoa| 

 and the great advantage, in the most tenacious clays, • 

 at least a depth of 4 feet. Oustavus E. CwdtM, 2fi* 



borough, Northumberland. 



No. XV.— I have the singular privilege, in wpflMf 



here, of beaf 

 from 



aoie to preiace my own siaiemeuwu/«*-r- . 

 high authority on the chemical and structural condiM 

 of the soil in which these operations have been effect^ 

 as it lay previous to their commencement. Aspecw 

 of the soil and subsoil having been rotaitfeVJiJ 

 year 1845, to Professor Johnston, he wn>»w«jr 

 following analysis, appending thereto some vaicg 

 remarks and instructions (partially quoted beio« y* 

 have been of much service in directing the prow- 

 culture and management followed out. 



Analysis of Teawig. 



By Washing— Clay, fine sand, and organic J 



matter J 



Coarse sand and small stones 



Son 



93.07 



MH 



HJ 



•»i 



it 



By Analysis— Organic matter 



Alkaline salts soluble in water 



it 

 tt 

 tt 

 tt 



Si 



if 



it 



Gypsum, sulphate of lime 



Oxide of iron 



Alumina, soluble in acids 



Carbonate of lime ... 

 Carbonate of magnesia 

 Insoluble silicious matter 



-•♦ 



• » t 



• •• 



• f» 



■ •• 



• •• 



*!' 



• •« 



• «t 



t #- 



• ■• 



• • ■ 



• p- 



• ■- 



14* 



u 



Remarks.— It is a 



%#.* 



;in ciay, iwmcu, «~ , - - ^ 



would intimate, from the debris of the micas ^ 

 little assistance from the granite and from : tne o. ^^gjt 

 The proportion of oxide of iron, derived chiefly j ^m 



not excessive; and in a proper condmo" «™ ]ia #*mK 

 drained, thoroughly opened and well tuiea, w ^ *** 



ductive character; but I observe that tn^_^ fl 



dantly contains 



itself into little red lumps indicating »nu" iM<1 tW<«5 

 of the soil, that the air is not properly **™ l ?l tb „«*«• 

 exist among the soil particles of ochrey ^matwr ^ wat ^I» 



not be wholesome for the roots o'P'a"^...^" ^IT* 

 small quantity of organic matter in the row which i^J 

 imply that it has hitherto been in a conditio ^ w ^»j 

 roots would willingly descend into it. J hes fl e toiroder**^' 



thorough drainage and •"^"ol'^^iSro the »»» 

 t„ ♦>,,» »,ia,,f tho different kinds ot tooa »»«• . _ 



These remarks were written in J^ 184 1, fritf 



their accuracy could n Wl .»« ui"r - ^> 



the simple statement that the **£f b /*l0*2 

 going tenant of that year was «?»»£ h ^ *<J 

 144 bushels per acre, an estimate which ^ 



oduce actually n* 1 ;' tJtfW-rj 

 The whole farm has £ _# 

 ffects are eminently ^^ 



produce being now in the .'^*^% ep tiH-eJJ 

 what it was prior to draining and F^ jjr 

 the ochrey matter winch th ^ yjj 



B ot yet qf 6 .*^ 0** 



14£ bushels per 

 in excess of the pr 

 incoming tenant. 



described as " not w 



come in contact with, 1 " » »»• /y ^ het t » Dl V£ e *r 

 ralised, hence the produce of vv _ a ^^r 



neuti 



appoints expectation, while green 



crops 



are * 





