184 EF. W. Milgard— Objects and Interpretation of Soil Analyses. 
vitriol or fluohydric acid. I cannot wonder that this laborious 
process, with solvents arbitrarily chosen, an ithout any 
known relation to the solvent action exerted by roots, should 
have found so little acceptance, and has on the contrary per- 
haps rather served to confirm the common impression of the 
uselessness of soil analysis; especially when contrasted with 
such a huge amount of work, ending after all in mere guesses. 
I have vainly sought, in the recorded results of such investi- 
gations, for any such ray of light on the functions of the sev- 
eral soil ingredients, as would even remotely justify the labor 
involved. 
him about the value of a soil, than the best chemist alive.” 
Now, we may perhaps agree with Professor Johnson in this 
matter, so long as we find the old farmer on his native heath, - 
and so long as he is exceptionally intelligent. But all farmers 
are not old; and it is particularly the young ones that stand 
in need of advice, when they “ go west.” Moreover, old 
farmers will frequently disagree widely in their estimate of the 
qualities and value of a soil; and then who shall decide? 
And who shall tell the hundreds of thousands of settlers and 
emigrants annually occupying new lands of whose quality, at 
resent, no one knows anything, what they may reasonably 
expect of their soil, apart from the bare assertions of inter: 
