340 ; Catalogue of Works 



" Crops cultivated for seed, seldom or never show any superior luxuriance 

 after the first stages of growth ; if they do even then, the increase is in the 

 bulk and weight of the seed. 



" These peculiarities are the foundation of the opposition to the employ- 

 ment of salt as a fertilizer. How few farmers will take the trouble to 

 ascertain these points ! How few will follow an experiment to the measure 

 which does not promise anything to the eye ! How few will vary the time 

 and quantity of the application ! I do not hesitate to say, that all the suc- 

 cessful experiments which are recorded as made by strictly practical men, 

 are entirely the results of chance ; chance determined both the time of 

 applying the salt, and the quantity used. Had any other season or quantity 

 been casually adopted, the result might have been unfavourable, and the 

 experimenters ranged themselves with the opponents of salt. Another 

 class of the opponents of salt manure, are those who have witnessed the 

 devastating effects of an excess of salt ; they cannot imagine a small quan- 

 tity can benefit, when a large one destroys. Your correspondent " Agro- 

 nome," appears to be an opponent of salt from all the above causes. He 

 evidently never has tried an experiment with salt ; he was " twenty years 

 ago" self-sufficient ; his letter teems with something a little like a spirit of 

 prejudice, and he holds up some ash trees "whose sap was completely con- 

 verted into brine," by applying salt abundantly to their mangled bark and 

 roots, as a warning extremely notable. His detail of the application of salt 

 to the fallow field, is decidedly favourable to its employment. There is one 

 absurd misrepresentation in his letter, which may require correction ; he 

 observes, " Mr. Johnson says, that weeds grow more luxuriously on walks 

 after having been killed by salt." This is a moderate. specimen of false 

 quotation ; my words are, " Those who apply salt for this purpose, (the 

 destruction of weeds on gravel-walks), must repeat the application at least 

 every other year ; if the salt is not in excess, it promotes the growth of the 

 weeds," (Gard. Mag. vol. II. p. 2.) — not those which have been destroyed, 

 but others which will succeed them. In his remarks upon applying salt to 

 pinks and carnations, he should have kept in mind that it is the practice of 

 Mr. Hogg of Paddington, and not my own unadvised recommendation. 



" In conclusion let me observe, that we ought to rejoice to observe the 

 gradual suffusion of education, and the mole-hills of prejudice, and the 

 multitude of the self-sufficient, diminishing in the same ratio. Our gardens 

 are no longer under the direction of men who retain their profession as 

 unaltered as the New Zealand savages do the religion of their forefathers; 

 with as much bigotry, and as unenlightened. Our gardeners are now men 

 of science, and friends of improvement ; the present state of our horticul- 

 ture affords us overwhelming testimony of the benefits gained by this 

 revolution ; and the time must come when the sons of our agriculturists 

 have science mingled with their education, with at least as much justice as 

 their daughters are instructed in music, dancing, and languages. When that 

 day comes, and come it must, every proffered improvement will receive its 

 due share of examination. Such a general diffusion of science among the 

 cultivators of the soil, every friend of his country should endeavour to 

 promote; for it will not be until then, that agriculture can acquire the 

 power of becoming that which it professes to be — the art of obtaining the 

 best crops of certain plants at the least possible expence. 



" I am, Sir, &c. 



" C. W. Johnson." 

 Extracts from the Pamphlet. Horticulture. — " In the garden, much 

 good may be effected by a judicious employment of common salt. I am 

 indebted to my brother, Mr. George Johnson, for several important expe- 

 riments with salt, in the kitchen garden; they were made with much care, 

 and I can vouch for their correctness. 



