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POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
corn, treated with various artificial and natirral manures, and some without 
any manure at all, and proved to them mcontestably that the field fertilized 
with an artificial manure, containing the proper ju'oportions of potash, lime, 
phosphates, &c., produced the best crops. We understand that the fann of 
Belle Eau, like that at Vinceimes, has been placed at M. Ville’s disposal by 
the Emperor. 
Mr. Way on English Agriculture. — At the last meeting of the Chemical 
Society, Mr. Way read (or rather caused to be read) a paper, which was sup- 
posed to be upon the above subject, but was really an attack upon the doc- 
trines of Baron Liebig. It is 'well knovm that of late years our agriculturists 
have begun to discover the truth of Liebig’s theory, that ammonia is not to be 
regarded as a fertilizer, but rather as a stimulant, its mam office when sup- 
plied in excess being the solution of certain of the mineral constituents of 
plant food. We presume, therefore, that this was the reason why Mr. Way’s 
paper was contributed ; for it contained nothing which he has not stated 
already ad nauseam, and it certainly was far from an impartial review of 
opinions which differ from his own. His answer to Liebig’s assertion, that 
English farmers are exhausting the soil, was most obscme and unsatisfactory, 
and, so far as we could analyse it, seemed really to be an additional fact in 
support of the Baron’s view's. At the termination of iVIr. Way’s paper, 
Mr. Gilbert delivered a very vehement and lung-exhausting oration, in the 
course of which the facts (?) brought forw'ard by him w'ere repeated several 
times, and were strmig together in the most unhannonious and illogical 
manner. His main argument was that the soil is not being exhausted, because 
the produce is greater than ever. By parity of reasoning, our coal fields are 
not being exhausted, because the supply of coal is more extensive than it was 
fifty years ago. Will no one present Mr. Gilbert with a cox3y of “ Whately’s 
Elements,” or J. Stuart MiU’s famous treatise ? 
BOTANY. 
Peculiar mode of Configation among Navicular Eiatomacece. — Mr. H. J. 
Carter points out the maimer m wdiich the process of conjugation occurs 
among the latter forms of diatomace£e. The contents of the two conjugating 
frustules, after having jiassed into the usual spherical form of the sjiorangium, 
and then having undergone division into the twm smaller s^iores, each of the 
latter becomes elongated, separates in the equatorial Ime, and each hemisphere 
being carried out upon the ends of the contained sporangial frustule-cases in 
a cap-like form, remams there, till these sporangial cases attain their maximum 
development. Pari passu, the large frustule is produced within all, and ulti- 
mately a longitudinal fissure extending throughout the frustule-case gives exit 
to it by this kind of dehiscence. Besides the three conjugations which have 
been described by other writers, Mr. Carter has observed a fourth, and he thinks 
it is possible to observe others also. In conclusion, he expresses his oxiinion 
that the object of these repeated conjugations is to bring the size of the frus- 
tule from its embryonic state up to that of its maximum development. — Vide 
J ournal of Botany, Se]ptember. 
Structure of the Flower of Crucifers. — This is the subject of an important 
paper by Mr. W. G. Smith. There may be said to be four peculiar features 
