Fabruary 10, 1SS3.] JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GAKDENER. 



iot 



WEEKLY CALENDAR. 



Day Day 

 •f of 



M'nth Week. 



10 

 11 

 12 



13 

 14 

 15 

 16 



Tu 



W 

 Th 



P 



S 

 Sen 



M 



FEBRUARY 10-16, 1863. 



Weather near London in 1862. 



Barometer. Thermom. Wind. J 1 ", 11 in 

 Inches. 



Qcekn Victoria Married, 1840. 



W. Shenstoue died, 1763. 



Hen bit flowers. 



Sir J. Banks born, 1743. B. 



Valentine's Day. 



Shrove Sunday. 



A. Menzies died, 1S12. B. 



. &G. 



30.479-30 308 

 30.235-30.079 

 30.018-29.978 

 30.044—30.001 

 30.052—30.033 

 30.101—30.032 

 29.956-29.676 



degrees. 

 45—18 

 44-30 

 48—31 

 39—33 

 44—34 

 45—30 

 45-33 



X. 

 if. 



N. 

 N.E. 

 N.E. 



E. 



E. 



■06 



: Moon j Clock 



Sun I Sun Rises , Moon's before Day of 

 Rises. Sets, and Sets Age. ! Sun. Year. 



m. h. 

 26af7 



m. h. 



m. h. 



3af5 



3 m 



5 5 



17 1 



6 5 



32 2 



8 5 



38 3 



10 5 



35 4 



12 5 



19 5 



14 5 



56 5 



c 



24 

 25 

 26 

 27 

 2S 



41 



42 

 43 

 44 

 45 

 46 

 47 



Meteoroloot op the -Week.— At Chiswick, from observations during the last thirty-sis years, the average highest and lowest 

 temperatures of these days are 45.4° and 30.1° respectively. The greatest heat, 65', occurred on tne 10 h, in 1S31 ""and the loweft cold 0° 

 on the 13th, in 1855. During the period 160 days were fine, and on 92 rain fell ' ' ' 



DO OUE SOILS DECREASE IN FERTILITY? 



HE, opinion is, 

 that cultivated 

 soils not only 

 do not de- 

 crease in fer- 

 tility, but that 

 they increase 

 in productive- 

 ness. 



The subject 

 is not now 

 agitated for 

 the first time, 

 but has been revived by a correspondent in the Times, 

 who argues that the humus in soils is gradually exhaust- 

 ing, and that as it is exhausted those soils will become 

 barren. Such, however, is an erroneous conclusion. 



It was once believed, and is still believed by some men 

 of science, that the soluble portion of humus— that is, of 

 thoroughly^ decayed vegetables, which is called by them 

 apotheme, is an actual food of plants, entering at once 

 into their roots dissolved in the moisture of the soil. But 

 modern researches have rendered it certain that apotheme 

 is not thus absorbed by the roots of plants. Apotheme 

 gives out carbonic acid which is absorbed by the roots, 

 and they also absorb the salts and some other solids ; but 

 all in a dissolved state. 



So far is humus from being essential for fertility, that 

 some of the most fertile soils do not contain of it more 

 than two or three per cent., and plants will thrive and 

 be abundantly fruitful in soils where it is totally absent. 

 Do not let us be mistaken as saying that humus is not a 

 source of fertility, for it is so, undoubtedly ; but other 

 substances, such as animal substances, together with free 

 exposure to the air by fallowing, will impart to a soil even 

 a higher fertility than is imparted by humus. 



Another section of scientific men— also entitled to re- 

 spectful attention, for their leader is Liebig— believe that 

 so far are plants from requiring humus in the soil, that 

 they derive all their carbonaceous or combustible con- 

 stituents from the air, and only their mineral or incom- 

 bustible constituents from the soil. In consequence of 

 this Liebig concludes that our lands are gradually be- 

 coming exhausted, and, eventually, will become barren, 

 by being deprived of the mineral constituents required 

 by plants. This dreaded mineral famine we believe to be 

 as visionary as the dreaded humus famine. 



A third section of authorities, having great antiquity 

 and modern practice to sustain them, maintain that 

 stirring the soil, and its long exposure to the air— in 

 other words, well-worked and protracted fallowing— is 

 the chief necessary to insure fertility. "What IB' cul- 

 tivating a soil well? Ploughing it thoroughlv. What 

 is the second essential? To plough it. What is the 

 third? To manure it," were the words of Cato, written 

 more than two thousand years since ; and Jethro Tull, and 

 Mr. Smith, of Lois Weedon, have even gone beyond that 

 No. 98.— Yol. IV., New Sekibs. 



ancient, for they say manuring is needless. Such soils 

 as those of Lois Weedon, a crop and a fallow alternately 

 would, not exhaust of their phosphoric acid and potash, 

 probably, during the existence of more than one gene- 

 ration. But there are lighter soils which two or three 

 years of such culture would exhaust of those minerals, 

 and render them profitlessly unproductive. 



We have no fear of our cultivated soils becoming 

 barren either from an exhaustion of their humus or their 

 mineral constituents ; but neither do we look for succour 

 to fallowing alone. We agree with Cato, for we think 

 that good tillage is two-thirds of a soil's good cultivation ; 

 but we also think, as he did, that the other third is good 

 manuring. 



Above all, we know as a fact that our soils now pro- 

 duce far more per acre than they did five centuries ago, 

 and that year after year farms now yield crops quite as 

 abundant as they did in the time of the tenant's grand- 

 father. There are— or, at least, we knew them "thirty 

 years since — fields in the Hundreds of Essex, which 

 had borne crops of Beans and Wheat alternately for a 

 time so long, that, as the lawyers say, " the memory of 

 man runneth not to the contrary ; " and we never met 

 with a farmer or gardener of any soil in the United 

 Kingdom, who, if he had labour and fertilisers at com- 

 mand, ever found the soil decline in productiveness. If 

 we needed an illustration, we would quote the market 

 gardens around London, where Potatoes and Cabbages 

 are grown alternately, and have been so grown for a 

 century. 



We do not state without authority that our soils 

 produce far more than they did five centuries since, for 

 we have recorded in Fleta, who wrote about the year 

 1290, that the farmer could pay no rent, and must himself 

 be a loser unless he could obtain six bushels of Wheat 

 per acre.— (Fleta, ii., cap. 8 ) So small a produce may be 

 accounted for partly by the best soils being devoted to 

 pasturage, flocks and herds being more required than 

 corn to supply the culinary demands of a household 

 whose chief food in those times was flesh meat. 



As the vegetable portion of a household's regimen 

 increased in proportion to that of the animal portion, so 

 were the better soils converted from pasture to arable, 

 which may in part account for our finding Harrison, 

 writing in 1587, in the eighteenth chapter of his intro- 

 duction to " Holinshed's Chronicle," stating, "Certainly 

 the soil is even now in these our days grown to be much ■ 

 more fruitful than it hath been in times past." This he 

 goes on to state was the case not only in England, but 

 in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales ; " so that each nation 

 manureth her own with triple commodity to that it was 

 beforetime." " Throughout the land (if you please to 

 make an estimate thereof by the acre) in mean (average) 

 and indifferent years, wherein each acre of Eye or Wheat 

 well tilled and dressed, will yield commonly sixteen or 

 twenty bushels, which proportion is notwithstanding oft... 

 abated towards the north, as it is oftentimes surmounted 

 in the south." 



Supposing these quantities to be correct, though there 

 No. 750.— Vol. XXIX., Old Sejhdss. 



