on Permanent Meadow Land. 
419 
that in the dry substance of the over-luxuriant, unevenly-ripened, 
and laid and damaged produce, grown by the same mineral 
manure and the double or excessive amount of ammoniacal salts, 
was 1'96. It will not be doubted, that the higher percentage 
of Xitrogen was, under these circumstances, coincident with a 
more crude and less favourable condition of the constituents 
of the hay. It has been shown experimentally by Professor 
\roelcker, that succulent plants may contain a part of their 
nitrogen in the condition of ammoniacal salts ; and Professor 
Sullivan has more recently called attention to the apparently 
frequent occurrence of both ammonia and nitric acid in the sap of 
plants. We had too, ourselves, long since pointed out, that turnips 
in which the percentage of Nitrogen was raised beyond a com- 
paratively low amount by means of highly nitrogenous manures 
were, weight for weight, of less feeding value — indeed they were 
sometimes even purgative and injurious — than those having a 
far lower percentage of Nitrogen, but which were in a less crude 
and succulent, and a more highly elaborated condition.'* 
Attention should be called to the fact, that the produce grown 
b\- nitrate of soda alone, like that grown by ammoniacal salts 
alone, contained a much higher percentage of Nitrogen, than 
that grown without manure.f Again, the addition of mineral 
manure to the nitrate of soda, by which the crop was consider- 
ably increased, gave a produce containing a lower percentage of 
Nitrogen than that groma bv nitrate of soda alone. 
Before leaving the results of Table XV., it may be observed 
that, takinrf the average of the three seasons, the addition of am- 
moniacal salts to farmyard manure, gave a produce containing a 
slightly higher percentage of Nitrogen. In the second season, 
however, which was the one of the highest dryness and matura- 
tion of the hay, at the time of cutting, a contrary result was 
obtained. 
From the whole of the results in regard to nitrogen, it would 
appear, that a high percentage is by no- means a safe indication 
of relatively high feeding quality. In fact, in succulent and 
unripened produce more particularly, it is an uncertain indica- 
tion even of high amount of elaborated nitrogenous vegetable 
compound. 
Woody Fibre. 
The constituent of vegetable food-stufFs, to which the term 
" xcoody fibre " is frequently given, is that portion which remains 
* ' Jour. Roy. Agr. Soc. Eng.,' vol. x. (1849), pp. 306-315 inclusive. 
+ As the amount of nitrogen in the hay grown by the nitrate of soda, was 
determined by combustion with soda lime, and estimation as ammonia by the 
volumetric method, the high amount recorded in the Table could not be due to 
ondecomposed nitric acid or nitrate. 
2 E 2 
