516 Abstract Report of Agricultural Discussions. 
truthfulness of that part of the Report, and am myself prepared to declare that 
salt is of no value at all as a manure, if used without any other fertilizing 
matter. But I am ready to alter my opinion respecting mixtures, as double 
decompositions may be produced in the womb of Mother Earth." 
Thus it appears that M. Barral is of opinion that salt has no value 
as a manure itself, but that it may act usefully in conjunction with 
other manures. So far as my own experiments have proceeded, I have 
always used it in conjunction with other manures; but the results 
have not been satisfactory. 
It may be asked, Why should not salt be useful when we find it 
existing largely in a certain class of plants '? There can be no douht 
that salt is to be found in a certain class of plants ; but the question 
of the value of salt depends, I think, not so much upon what is found 
in the plant as upon what is sent off the farm. If salt is taken out 
of the land by a plant which is consumed on the farm, as is the case 
with mangold wurzel, it may be concluded that the salt is not exported, 
and that it therefore needs not to be replaced by import. As to 
grain, an analysis of ripe corn will show that it contains little or no 
salt : there is just a trace of it, and nothing more. 
Animals undoubtedly contain salt. I have had a great many 
animals analyzed at different times, and you may assume, as a general 
rule, that an animal, as he stands alive, contains about 3 per cent, of 
mineral matter ; an ox about 4 per cent., and sheep and pigs about 2J. 
Three per cent, may bo taken as an average of mineral matter, and of 
this about 8 per cent, is salt. Therefore an ox weighing 1000 lbs. 
contains about 2 j lbs. of salt, and a sheep or a pig weighing 1 cwt. 
contains about 4 ounces of salt. Hence the amount of salt carried 
off the farms by animals is very small indeed. 
A great many experiments have been made for the purpose of ascer- 
taining the amount of salt which falls on the land through the medium 
of rain. I do not wish to go into figures, but there can be no doubt 
that a large quantity does descend in that way upon our soil. In 
our climate, surrounded as we are by sea, the fall of 'salt m rain is 
decidedly larger than the amount carried off the land by salts from the 
farm, and consequently, so far as our fields require salt, they obtain it 
from that source. 
Without expressing any very strong opinion on the subject, I would 
say that the general conclusion at which I have arrived is that salt 
does not act beneficially as a manure, though it has occasionally an 
action of some kind or other ; and that if there are many well cultivated 
farms on which salt is used, there are also many which are kept in the 
highest condition without the purchase of it. I am not at all prepared to 
say that the former are not as well farmed, or do not produce as good 
crops as the latter. I cannot help thinking, that the large amount of 
money which is expended annually on salt as a manure throughout 
the British Isles is not returned in the produce. There may be some 
cases in which it is, but I think that, as a general rule, the outlay of 
money is not returned in increased production. 
