On Clover Allies as Fodder Plants. 293 
100 parts of Peas, unripe Straw, and Fruit, contained. 
Air, Dry. 
Water 13-050 
Nitrogeniscd or flesh-forming constituents 17-975 
Substances not containing nitrogen applied in the 
animal economy to support respiration or to lay 
on fat : — 
a. Soluble in a solution of caustic potasli .. .. 35-9G;} 
h. Insoluble in a solution of potash ., .. .. 28-760 
Ashes 4-250 
100-000 
IV. — Ongerychis — Saintfoin. 
Onohrychis saliva. 
Onohrychis saliva, var. hifera. 
These two names indicate tte varieties in the market, the 
peculiarity in the second form being a capability of producing 
two crops of foliage and flowers in one season. 
The Onohrychis saliva, Sanfoin or Saintfoin is, according to 
Bentham, " a native of limestone districts, in central and 
southern, and temperate Asia ; much cultivated for forage, and 
occasionally naturalized further northward ; in Britain believed, 
to be truly indigenous in southern and eastern England, but not 
recorded from Ireland." 
In England it is extensively cultivated on the central or Cots- 
wold range of hills, whereon the oolitic limestone extends ; for, 
like the Papilionacea', in general it delights in calcareous soils, 
and its mode of growth peculiarly adapts it to the thin lands 
by which calcareous rocks are so often covered. The plant is 
remarkable for possessing a long tapering root-stock, which 
descends deep into the crevices of the substratum. I have traced 
it for as much as five feet in a downward direction, more or 
less straight, according to the amount of resistance ; and as this 
root-stock is perennial its lateral ramifications become more and 
more strongly developed, and so, in spite of the thinness of the 
soil, the abundant herbage of the plant is maintained ; its inor- 
ganic elements being derived from a depth inaccessible to most 
other species. These substances are thus brought to the sur- 
face, and if the plant be wholly depastured, are left behind as an 
augmentation of the usually thin surface soils which pertain ta 
where it is cultivated, so that besides being in itself a useful 
plant for its forage, the Saintfoin may be truly looked upon as a 
pioneer of fertility in stony calcareous soils. 
The crop, though truly perennial, dies out more or less 
rapidly in proportion to the quantity of hay made from it, and 
the age of the plant when cut ; if, therefore, Saintfoin is to be 
