March i, 1898.] 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
623 
iu a merchantable condition. On the latter point, I 
may say that Messrs. Boyle & Co.’s representative, 
Mr. Macdonald, visited Thana in Novemb-r, but not 
with his machine, and after conducting experiments 
with the cut stem.s of C. (jifiantea, came to the con- 
clusion that his machine, which is utilized extensively 
in the Straits Settlements for extracting Khea fibre, 
could extract fibre from C. gigantea with certain slight 
modifications. He is so convinced of this that he has 
addressed the Bombay Government to obtain certain 
concessions to exploit the fibre in Bombay for a 
lengthened period. The action taken by Messrs. 
Boyle & Co. tends rather to upset the conclusions 
previously come to by Dr. Watt, who pnducted ex- 
periments on the fibre in conjunction with liSr. Cross 
of Lincoln’s Inn and who says Dictionary of Econo- 
mic Products Vol. II. page 40.) “ Tne opinion we 
arrived to confirms the verdict already given tha.t the 
mechanical difficulties are too great and the ultimate 
fibrils too short to justify high hopes being entertained 
of Madar bast fibre becoming of any great com- 
mercial importance, although its great beauty makes 
one resign it with regret.” 
Mr. Gleadow appears to be of opinion that the plant 
is of such a straggling light-demanding habit, that it 
could not probably he grown dense enough to give 
any considerable yield ; but he seiuis not to have 
made any experiments on the point. In qur. Strettell s 
pamphlet on C. gigantea published in 1878 (page 73) 
he gives the yield of fibre per acre at 682 lb. or 727 lb. 
where waste is guarded against, and I have never 
seen his estimate controverted. 
30th Dec. 1897. G. M. E. 
—Indian Forester. 
THE FIXATION OF ATMOSPHERIC 
NITROGEN BY DEAD LEAVE!. 
Following the important work of M. Henry, whose 
successful research will be doubly grateful to many 
Indian foresters for reasons of personal regard, comes 
a note by M. L. Detrle on the same problem, viz,, 
the reasons for the continual improvement of forest 
soils, notwithstanding the fact that more nitrogen is 
removed from them than is known to be acquired by 
them. The disastrous results of the removal of dead 
leaves, causing sometimes a loss of as much as 50 per 
cent., of the normal annual production, are well known 
to foresters, but have not yet been borne in upon 
the unwilling minds which oppose forest conservancy. 
This loss, at any rate the moat serious loss is nitro- 
gen. As regards sufficiency of other food supply, it 
may be granted that all soils, all waters, all atmos- 
pheres are rich enough to keep forests growing for 
ever. The minera' constituents, salts, &c., necessaiy 
to the continued formation of cellulose, staich and 
other reserve materials, are always to be found in 
sufficient quantities, resulting from decompositions or 
recombinations in the soil or atmosphere. But nit- 
rogen, the indispensable, the arbiter of the rate of 
growth, even of life and death, is an extremely vari- 
able quantity. The German experimental staiious 
proved the amount of loss growth caused by the remo- 
val of dead leaves. M. Grandeau showed that the 
covering of dead leaves has a great influence on the 
amount of nitrogen carried in the soil. Then came the 
knowledge of the important part played by micro- 
organisms, moulds, ferments, microbes &c., in the 
decomposition of vegetable matter, and it was seen that 
the layer of dead loaves is not only a layer of partly 
digestible food material, hut is especially a layer of 
microbes, ferments, &c., a kitchen in fact, where the 
indigestible materials are rendered easily assimilable. 
It follows that the mere raking about of the layer, 
not to speak uf its removal, inte.rrupcs the mu robe- 
cooks and the scullion ferments at their work, and 
may even kill and bury them under the ruins of their 
kitchen. 
The removal of leaves is thus a wasteful process, 
since the benefit accruii.g to the robber is far less 
than the damage caused to the forest. About this 
period, namely June 1893, M. Detrie just glimpsed 
the conclusions which M, Henry h^a worked out, 
since he wrote that “ the removal, or mere moving, 
of the layer of dead leaves, not only interferes with 
the formation of vegetable mould, but actually 
diminishes the fixation of nitrogen in the soilhj stopping 
the development of micro-organisms." It remained for 
M. Henry to decipher the details. Even yet, there 
are illeg.ble lines at the bottom of the page, and M. 
Detrie asks for an interpretation. Granted that the 
increment is affected by the chemico-physical action 
of the layer of dead leaves, how can .this be recon- 
ciled with the admittedly gi.cu.ser increment in the 
standards after the cutting of the coppice, that is 
to say, at a period when the layer has been prasti- 
cally destroyed? M. Bartet’a experiments snowed 
that in high forest of 3 ages, up to a height of 9 m. 
30 cm, the curve of diametral increment is inflected 
from the 1st to the 3rd decennial period, that it, 
inversely to the thickness of the layer of dead leavet. 
The cause of this greater increment is not explained, 
although theories more or less at variance with existing 
kuowleoge have been propounded. The problem has 
puzzled M. Detrie for the last 10 years, perhaps some 
Indian forester can throw light upon it.— Indian 
Forester. 
INDI.4N Soils and Differing Authorities. 
— The final Report of Dr. Leather .as the subject 
of consideration in the Indian Agriculturist and 
from the conclusion of its article, w'e quote as 
f ollows : — 
Professor Wallace, of Edinburgh, it will be re- 
membered, in his work on Indian Agriculture, answers 
with an emphatic negative the question whether the 
fertility of the soil is beicg exhausted by native 
practices. “ Temporary fertility, the qualities pos- 
sessed in virtue of some accumulation of material 
useful to plants, may,” he says, “ be dissipated ; 
but when this is gone, no system of cr.opping can 
reduce the land to a lower point. The greater portion 
of the land in India which is not newly broken in, 
annually produces its minimum yield. Where declin- 
ing fertility has been recorded, it was no doubt due to 
loss of temporary fertility which had accumulated 
during a period of rest.” Dr. Leather, however, points 
out that the distinction between temporary and 
natural fertility of soils is only a question of terms, 
and maintains that, while “ the presence of a store 
of ‘ temporary ’ fertility in the past may or may not 
be the case, the opinion that a soil cannot be reduced 
in feilility below a certain level is one for which 
there is absolutely no proof ; on the other hand, we 
have the fact that in the Rothamstead and Woburn 
experimental fields in England, crops which have 
been grown for so many years without the aid of 
manure, do annually become less and less, and the 
limit (if there be one) has not so far been reached.” 
However this may be, moreover the fact, as he 
points out, remains, that it is much more important 
to consider how the fertility of the land can be 
increased than .whether it is becoming exhausted. 
It is beyond doubt not only that the fertility of the 
land in India is low compared with that of the land 
of other countries, but that, if it is not decreasing, 
it is certainly not increasing, and, with a better 
supply of manure, it would be at once increased and 
more grain produced per acre. For that better 
supply of manure, he is rightly of opinion that there 
is, under Indian economic conditions, but one principal 
source, viz., the dejecta of the animals and human 
beings that consume very nearly the whole of the 
grain crops ; and ” it is in the more perfect direct 
(not indirect) return to the land of these matters, 
that one can look for an increased manure 
supply; an increased fertility an increased out- 
turn of food-gr.iin.” As bearing on his remark 
that tne fertility of the land in India is 
low compared with that of the land in other 
countries. Dr. Ls.ither states, it may be noted, that, 
of all lire Indian soils he has met with, the only 
soils to which the term “rich” can be at all 
applied were from a single limited area, viz., a coffee 
eatate in tho Shevaroy Hills. 
