146 THE SOUTHER?^ CULTIVATOR. 
which lucerne lives more than upon any other. 
Take the ash ot the different kinds of grain, 
and you will find that each in its own way af- 
fects’ the soil. Wheat, oats and rye, require a 
large quantity of phosphoric acid, and so if you 
grow wheat a long time in tlie same soil, it will 
draw ont this phosphoric acid among other 
thi ngs, and thereby reduce its quantity. This 
is what is meaiptby exhausting the soil. It rye 
grass is the plarV used, it will exh.aust the soil 
generally, becai^e it does not take away a great 
portion of any one ol the substances. In the 
same way different crops make the soil poor; 
but if I take the same orop, say filteen or twen- 
ty times, a practice which, as is well known to 
the most of you, existed not many years ago, it 
would by that time produce no crop at all. 
The land then may be exhausted in two ways 
—generally of all the substances, and specially, 
of particular substances ; and from this circum- 
stance v/e are enabled again to make two or 
three practical deductions. In the lirst place, 
inasmuch as the soiLcontains a limited quanti- 
ty ot these substances, and inasmuch as differ- 
ent crops carry off" different portions, you at 
once see w'hy it is judicious to have a rotatii,in 
of crops— that the longer the time is which 
elapses before you take a similar crop, the long- 
er will the soil last and continue productive. 
A soil may produce one crop, when it cannot 
produce another. Let us inquire next why 
land is raanared. The composition of the soil 
would tell you in the first instance, for it is ob- 
vious that manure is applied to restore those 
things which are wholly or comparatively want- 
ing. Chemistry tells practical men how to re- 
new the«ir exhausted soil. Suppose that fifteen 
crops of oats have been taken off a piece of Ian i, 
it will lose a large quantity of lime, phosphoric 
acid and potash, and in order to restore it 
you must supply the soil with those ingre- 
dients of which it has been robbed. Manure 
being composed of theremainsof vegetables ta- 
ken off'the land, and containing all those things 
of which the plant consists, the farmer, gener- 
ally speaking, is enabled by its aoplicaiion to 
retain the fertility of the soil. But then, ob- 
serve you, he adds all those things which are re- 
quired for a fertile soil, which may be a great 
deal too much, and may not supply an adequate 
abundance of that particular substance which 
the land actually requires, and thus a great ex- 
pense is en»ailed which he may not be able to 
undertake, and thus the land falls sho.n ot that 
richnesss which he wishes, and which, at a less 
expense, he might be able by other means, un- 
der the guidance of chemical knowledge, to pro- 
vide for his land. It the farmer knows chemis- 
try, he will, at far less cost, and far more effec- 
tually, secure good crops. 
I come next to the organic part of the plant. 
You observe, when I take this wheatfiourdough 
and wash it in water, it diminishes in bulk, and 
the water becomes milky. The portion that 
remains, for it will not all wash away, is a 
sticky substance, and this is called gluten. If 
the water is allowed to stand a short lime, the 
whit# will fall to the bottom and form starch. 
The flour is thus easily separated into two pans, 
the starch and the gluten. 1 flint or hemp .seed 
is put into a press and squeezed, a large quanti- 
ty ol oil will come out, but not the whole that 
the plant contains, and this is the case with all 
seeds, more or less, though the tatty matter ma v 
not be so abundant perhaps as lo produce oil liy 
pressure merely. Wheat contains gluten to the 
extent of from 10 to 13 percent.; meadow hay 
40 per cent, of starch. Of lat, wheat contains 
from 2 to 4 per cent.; straw, sometimes 3 per 
cent. ; oats, 6 percent. ; Indian corn, 9 percent., 
and meadow hay, from 2 to 5 percent. Thus 
the oiganic part ot vegetable matter contains 
gluten, starch and fat, 
I shall now make a few observations on the 
composition of the animal. Of what does the 
ash of animals consistl The body, you know, 
is composed of various parts— of muscles, lat, i 
bone and oth^r elements which I need notde’ail. j 
Let us examine the composition ot the muscle, I 
and we shall find that it contains two and a half 
per cent, of phosphate ol lime, and a third per 
cent ol other saline matters. In bones yoj# 
do not haye all the substances which exist in 
wheat, but you have some ol them, such as 
lime, magnesia, &c. In ten gallons ot milk 
there is three-fourths ot a pound of saline mat- 
ter; so that if you lake the compo.siiion of the 
muscle, of the bone, and of the milk together, 
you will find that animals contain the different 
substances which are to be lound in the soil. 
Thus it is we learn the intimate connection be- 
tween the composition of the inorganic matter 
of the plant, ol the animal and of the soil. But 
where does the animal get this inorganic mat- 
lerl They obtain it from the plants. In bone, 
six-tenths of the whole consists of phosphate of 
lime and magnesia. Nove an animal could not 
support itself or walk about without some bone 
or firm substance to uphold it. It feeds upon 
herbage, which ii must have, in order to obtain 
those different substances of which it is made 
up. But it the plant had no soda or n.agnesia, 
the bone could not be built up no more than the 
walls of this house could be erected without 
lime, stone and other substances. It is necessa- 
ry, then, that the plant should have all these 
substances, in order to supply them to ih« ani- 
mal creation — a purpose which it could not ful- 
fill unless it contained all that is necessary to 
build up their bodies. And where does the 
plant get these substances! It gets them from 
the soil; nor can a plant live without them. 
And here we have a beautiful example ot the 
provisions of nature, for a plant cannot grow, 
it cannot appear at all, unless it can acquire 
those elements, and that, too, just because, if it 
did live, it might indeed deck the surface of the 
earth, but it would not be able to feed animals, 
which is its great purpose in the creation. 
(Loud applause.) Thus a beautitul thread of 
philosophy pervades and connects all those dit- 
feient substances. Of what does the organic 
matter consist in animals? It consists of two 
parts, the muscle and the fat, and you will re- 
member we have three things in the plant, fai, 
gluten and siarch. if 1 laKe a pieci- of muscle 
and wash it, 1 shall wash out the blood and 
make it like the color of fat, and upon tearing 
it out it will be seen to be fibrous. When the 
fibre is analysed, it is found to be the same thing 
as the gluten in wheat. If you take the lat of 
anim.'ils and compare it with the tat in plants, 
you will find a remarkable anal gy to each 
other, though they are not absolutely identical, 
and I believe they could very easily be converted 
into each other. The organic matter of vege- 
tables contains the same substances ol the mus- 
cle ol animals. Vegetables contain a large 
proportion of that which will very readily form 
the fat of animals, the only difference being 
that animal matter contains no starch. Let us 
now see what is the purpose for which the ani- 
mal eats its food. Unquestionably lor the sup- 
port of ihe different parts of which it consists. 
You see again what a beautiful connection e.v- 
ists between the organic part of the plant and 
that of the animal. The animal eah: gluten in 
order lo form the fibre. When I eat rolls at 
breakfast, I eat a quantity of gluten and starch, 
and that gluten saves the digestive organs the 
trouble of inaniiracturing gluten lor the frame. 
Out of those rude elements which constitute the 
soil, and which float in the air, it is the duty ol 
the plant to prepare' those substances — those 
bricks as it were, to be carried away by the 
builder to fill up different gaps which ate con- 
tinually made in the body. There is a great 
difference between starch and gluten. That 
substance called nitrogen exists in the latter but 
not in the former; in the fibre, and not in the lat 
of animals. Thus nitrogen is obtained wholly 
fiom the soil, therefore it is necessary it should 
be in the soil. In beans gluten exists lo the I ex- 
tent ot 28 per cent, it', therefore, you or I eat 
herns we cat that which is capable of building 
up a much larger proportion of muscle in the 
body. 
Again, if the soil contains a large proportion 
of gluten, beans will grow when no other plant 
would. Some animals lay on the lat very abun 
dantly, and some, like myself, lay it on very 
sparingly. (Laughter.) If you can have an 
animal inclined to lay on fat leed him w ith In- 
dian corn. There is an important difference 
between the composition ot the vegetable and 
that of the animal ; in the tormer there is gluten, 
starch and fat; in ihelaiter, muscle and fat on- 
Iv. The lungs are a sort ot carbonic acid ma- 
nufacturers. The .starch we throw off to the 
air, the plant.? suck in, and thus it is the leaves 
are continually in motion, beating against the 
air, forming a thousand little mouths which per- 
petually suck in the carbonic air which forms 
starch. A man throws off about seven ounces 
per day of carbonic acid. Thus it would not be 
enough to eat merely ot fibre and fat, but we re- 
quire to eat the vegetable substances which con- 
tain starch, gluten and fat, because the general 
purpose ot nature is to .save the stomach the 
trouble of manufacturing these substances lor 
itself. The lungs might suck in the same as 
plants do, but such is not the order ot nature, 
and it falls to plants to supply the deficiency. 
The stomach can build more easily from car- 
bonic acid than It could from muscle. In (ced- 
ing young stock the farmer must give as much 
as will not only supply the daily deficieiicy, but 
also simply an increase o( muscle and bone. 
You all know that every part of our body is 
continually undergoing a change, and that a 
certain quantity ol gluten must be ealen every 
day to supply it, and it is the same with young 
animals, and therefore they require an extra 
supply of the elements of muscle and bone, in 
order that they may increase in size. You may, 
by attending to thedifferent qualities of the kind 
of food, make your animal either very fleshy, 
very bony, or very fat. Animals reject in dung 
and other excrements a great many substances, 
and as the plants contain substances which are 
soluble with water, it is of great consequence to 
take care of the liquid excrescences, and to mix 
it with the solid, so that the whole the animal 
ate may be preserved, which, being taken back 
to the soil, it is provided with the same subslan- 
ces almost forever, if you allow the liquid to 
run into the rivers, you bare the land of what 
the plant gels from the soil, and which the ani- 
mal gets from tie plant. When the animal 
dies, all tho.se things which it got is returned lo 
the soil, and thus the same revolution goes on 
from the soil to the plant, and from the plant to 
the animal. (Applause.) 
These are some of the points, gentlemen, by 
relating which I wish to interest you; which 
demonstrate the overruling presence of One 
mind, directing practical operations to the same 
end. if there was not the same spirit and in- 
tellect pervading- in the nature of the soil, the 
plants and the animals, there would be some 
confusion; but as they do exist, there is mani- 
fested the presence ot One mind and of one 
principle, directing the whole cycle of animal 
and vegetable life, as there is to be seen in all 
the cycles and motions ot the planetary bodies. 
(Loud applause.) In wishing lo teach tho.'^e 
under you the elementary principle of agricul- 
tural chemistry, I don’t wish you to leave out of 
view the beautiful and powerful evidence which 
it affords of the existence of a deity who is pre- 
sent ai all times, and regulates in his infinite 
wisdom all our affairs and intercourse. I there- 
fore concur entirely in the remarks of Mr. Py- 
per, that moral training is above all things ne- 
cessary for the young. Moral training comes 
first, intellectual next, and practical last of ail ; 
but yet all are here combined, for by this prac- 
tical knowledge you can give the young mind a 
new view of natural theology. It is not mere- 
ly chemistry cr physiology, but this science 
seems to be one of the most beautiful pictures of 
natural theology. (Applause.) I might tell 
you there is a great deal of poetrv in the sketch 
I have presented to you. The whole plane’ary 
system in dead masses float in space, an ■ the 
dead earth forms the subject which geoloeists 
contemplate; but on the surface of this dead 
earth you have a soil, a vegetable and an ani- 
mal life, subject to changes which must inte- 
rest and concern every inquirer. Suppose the 
