444 



The Neglect of Chemistry by Practical Farmers. 



distinguished chemists with one another, in order that the farmer 

 may be able to form some opinion as to the degree of reliance to 

 be placed upon the results there stated ; but when there appears 

 to be any great discrepancy, I would advise him to select those 

 that are the mean of the greater number of analyses ; and, other 

 things being equal, I would prefer the analyses made by our own 

 chemists, not from any national vanity, but from the fact of their 

 time being wholly devoted to agricultural subjects, and also from 

 the superior facilities afforded them by the various agricultural 

 associations that are at present established in this country. 



Some of my readers may perhaps object to the numerous 

 blanks that occur in the tables as being a waste of space, but I 

 would suggest that even these blanks may serve a useful purpose, 

 in directing the attention of chemists to those subjects which have 

 hitherto been passed over in their investigations, and also in 

 showing at a glance the amount of attention that any subject has, 

 up to the present time, received at their hands. 



For instance, Table A, on Corn Crops, has scarcely a vacant 

 line, whilst the analyses of Miscellaneous Crops are few and far 

 between, thus showing that the former subject, as was to be 

 expected, has received by far the larger share of the chemist's 

 attention. 



It may also be contended that as these analyses, v/hen by dif- 

 ferent authorities, have not been made upon the same identical 

 specimen, we have no right to assume that the respective compo- 

 sition of organic and inorganic matter remains the same when 

 their proportion to one another varies. There certainly is some 

 shov/ of reason in this objection ; but although there never was, 

 perhaps, any plant or other substance composed exactly of the 

 proportions given in these tables, yet if the analyses hitherto 

 published are to be of any practical service in aiding us to draw 

 general deductions as to the average composition of substances, 

 they must be considered to apply to all cases alike. 



I trust that the preceding remarks have been sufficiently explicit 

 to enable the general reader fully to understand the object and use 

 of these tables, as I did not feel warranted in devoting a greater 

 space to chemical explanations, considering the number of excel- 

 lent elementary works that have already been published on the 

 subject, to which I beg to refer any of my readers who may wish 

 to enter more deeply into these investigations. 



Additional Tables. — I now append two tables, the former of 

 which will be found useful in reducing the decimal parts, as 

 given in the tables, into their equivalents of the weights com- 

 monly used, and the second for reducing any analyses that are 

 recorded in the form of salts to the standard employed in these 

 tables. 



