splenic Apoplexy. 
253 
No. 4. 
Composition of a sample of Hard Water from JSlr. Taylor s Farm at 
TintinhuU. 
An imperial gallon contains — Grains. 
Solid matter 70-88 
Consisting of — 
Organic matter 4-64 
Mineral matters 6G-24 grains. 
Consisting of — 
Sulphate of lime 24-17 
Carbonate of lime 12-68 
Carbonate of magnesia 8-30 
Chloride of sodium 12-03 
Other alkaline salts 5-76 
Oxides of iron and alumina 1-70 
Silica 1-60 
Total per gallon 70-88 
If he understood the matter aright, this disease prevailed in the 
lias district in Somersetshire. 
On the tart lands prevailing on the lias clays, the herbage fre- 
quently remained unripe, and in this condition it produced several 
disorders. It might be worth while to examine chemically the 
herbage of the meadows where splenic apoplexy occurred, in order 
to ascertain whether an unripe condition of the grasses had any- 
thing to do with the disease. As regarded the condition of the 
herbage, he had found a remarkable difference between sound 
pasture and the pasture of scouring lands. Peats always produced 
isound herbage. There were clays which were well-drained, but 
which nevertheless required to be exposed to the air and culti- 
vated, and for which he believed the only remedy was the plough. 
They were naturally rich ; they were not poor in the sense of a 
deficiency of food ; there was plenty of mineral and organic food in 
the soil, but it was all locked up, and it was for this reason and 
the cold and frequently wet condition of the soil that the herbage 
did not get ripe. He had found great differences in the chemical 
composition of the perfectly ripe produce of peat and the unripe 
herbage of scouring lands, and, he repeated, that it would be inte- 
resting to ascertain whether a similar difference existed in the 
pasturage of soils where splenic apoplexy occurred. 
In conclusion, he would obsei-ve that the causes which produced 
scouring appeared to have some common origin with those which 
produced splenic apoplexj'. In that view he might be mistaken ; 
but it was certainly a fact that, on lias-clays, the produce did not 
get ripe, and, being consumed in an unripe state, it produced all 
kinds of diseases. It was a curious thing that manuring bad an 
effect the very reverse of what they would expect on the scouring 
land of central Somersetshire ; it made the evil worse. In a wet 
season, when one would expect to see the disease, it did not appear ; 
while in a dry summer, when there was a very rapid gi-owth of vcge- 
