Sdientific Agriculture! 



530 



[December, 1909. 



gests itself to any one acquainted with 

 bacteria in the soil and their life history 

 is that the solubility of the phosphates 

 is brought about by the action of bac- 

 teria. When the soil becomes dry and 

 parched the bacteria encyst or retire 

 into minute horny capsules, and their 

 activities cease ; when water is supplied 

 to them, the capsules absorb water and 

 burst, freeing the rested organisms, 

 which straightway start propagating 

 at the very rapid rate observed in such 

 organisms. 



This explanation is founded on ana- 

 logy ; but then similar analogies have 

 been proved to be actual facts in the cases 

 of carbon, nitrogen and sulphur, and it 

 is likely to prove so, judging from 

 Prianischnikoff's experiments, in the 

 case of the last essential constituent to 

 protoplasm. If it be so, then it is one 

 of the most beautiful examples of the 

 manner in which Nature preserves her 

 most precious assets against the proper 

 time. 



We come then to regard the organisms 

 of the soil as the inhabitants of the 

 globe persisting from a period when 

 it Avas still impossible for the higher 

 plants and animals to live upon it. 

 We can imagine the earth to have been 

 in such a state as Treub found the 

 island of Krakatoa in 1886, three years 

 after the great eruption, when the pri- 

 mitive rocks were teeming with micros- 

 copic life. In Krakatoa the whole island 

 had been reduced to a mass of glowing 

 ash ; but still, after a short interval, 

 the surface became slimy with micro- 

 organisms busily breaking down the sili- 

 cates and forming a subsoil which the 

 higher plants, later on, would take ad- 

 vantage of. In the early history of the 

 earth the soil became similarly formed, 

 but aeons of time had to pass before 

 the higher plants became developed and 

 were able to take advantage of the 

 habitat prepared for them. Heat, which 

 kills most living beings, was no hind- 

 rance, for the blue-green algaa live in 

 nearly boiling water to-day in the hot 

 springs ;* food, as we understand it, 

 these organisms did not require, as they 

 obtained their supplies directly from 

 the rocks. We can assert that plants 

 originally formed, collecting their car- 

 bon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and 

 phosphorous from the inorganic sub- 

 stances around them and then, with 

 their oily secretions forming emulsions 

 with water, creating, as Butschli has 



* As far as I can discover the highest recorded 

 temperature is 85° C. : A. Engler and K. Prantl. 

 Die Nat. Pflauzenfam-, 1. Teil, Leipzig, 1900, 

 p. 63. 



suggested, the primitive animals which 

 were to devour them. It is to the soil 

 that we should look as the seat of the 

 origin or organic life, not the sea. 



EXPERIMENTS ON THE VALUE OP 

 NITRO-BACTERINE. 



By C. T. GINNINGHAM, 

 Bacteriologist to the S. E. Agricultural 

 College, Wye, Kent. 



(Prom the Gardeners' Chronicle, Vol. 

 XLV„ No. 1, 152, January, 1909.) 

 In the spring of this year a culture 

 material known as " Nitro-bacterine," 

 for introducing into the soil those valu- 

 able bacteria which form nodules on the 

 roots of leguminous plants was largely 

 advertised. Its value and efficiency, at 

 least with garden crops, have now been 

 scientifically tested in a number of cases 

 with almost uniformly unfavourable 

 results. I would refer to the very com- 

 plete series of experiments carried out 

 on the inoculation of Peas with " Nitro- 

 bacterine "by Mr. F.J. Chittenden, p.l.s., 

 at the Royal Horticultural Society's 

 gardens at Wisley (J.R.H.S., Vol. 34, 

 part II., November, 1908). The following 

 sentences occur in his summary : — 

 " There was under no soil treatment a 

 consistent increase in the crop due to 

 inoculation. The uninoeulated seed gave 

 a crop 14 per cent, heavier than the 

 inoculated in the aggregate. It is con- 

 cluded that the inoculation of legu- 

 minous crops with " Nitro-bacterine " in 

 ordinary garden soil is not likely to 

 prove beneficial." Dr. Voelcker also 

 has given the material a trial at the 

 Royal Agricultural Society's farm at 

 Woburn, with results in no wise favour- 

 able to " Nitro-bacterine," and there is a 

 mass of private testimony to the same 

 effect. 



In these circumstances it will perhaps 

 be of interest if I briefly record the 

 results of an experiment on the inocu- 

 lation of Peas and Beans with "Nitro- 

 bacterine" at the S. E. Agricultural 

 College, Wye, Kent, which add further 

 confirmation to these conclusions. 



The varieties of Peas employed were 

 Carter's " Eight Weeks," " Early Morn " 

 and "Yorkshire Hero." Two sets of 

 trials were carried out (1) on very poor 

 soil just above the chalk, and "merely 

 dug over before sowing ; (2) on well- 

 manured trenched ground intended for 

 vegetable culture, Four rows of each 

 variety — each row 21 feet long — were 

 planted, and in each case a row sown 

 with inoculated seed alternated with a 



