SOTTTTIEUN CTTLTTVATOK. 
sucr.e^^s, I, Nil- Ilf. Vvfiiti iiiure nre iiiiiiiiii ili.iii any itiiiff airiii 
jri tiflns tun.;) 1 wus lurcii.ly inijtrr.^.sfd \vi;!i 
tlie fai't liiaL lie \v is educ if i ioi' liif fuM' tiCf u!- I.iv'.'-, ii..i 
husbandry, or iiihiiif. Tiie point vv’.iion I uri;e i n- con 
sidffiuion is tills; 'i'he most inadligfnt .liiisi)..M inien in id! 
nuioiis [):iy a’liliiiit tr.bute to thf -skill in tiieir p! oti; rsii n 
of a ti’.ni, who was, fortnnatciy, exonipl honi all a;^ricul 
tuiMl If i.dition.s, in.i looked to uio iem scicii. e alone fur 
direction. He drained, many ye.if-s ayo-), nearly 800 acres 
of wet land and had several hundreil in tillage, not to 
riiune Ins ex'eaisive meadows ;ind p istnres for keepin:^ 
stock Milking a -signal failure in early life with the too 
free nse of swainf) muck as a manure, lie went to Kdin 
buTijIi e.xpressly to study Cdteinisiry befire agrieuUural 
Chemistry had a name; and subsequently, by mixing 
marl and burnt lime with the rich vegetable matter in 
swamps, he not only corrected the acid sa'is of iron which 
had poisoned his crops for years, but obtaiueil both gyp 
Burn and bone earth, in a way I shall heieafier fully ex 
pi lin. Many problems in chemistry and agriculture now 
appear easy and simple which forty years ago were un- 
solved by the wisest of living men. 
Perhiips no man ever did more to develop the true prac 
tice of tillage than Jkthko Tut.n, the inventor of drill- 
husbandry. He lived a century and a iialf ago and was 
educated a lawyer, not a farmer. Whoever consults tlie 
literature of cigriculture as it exists in the Knglish, French, 
Germ.ui, Latin and Italian lanjjuages, will find that other 
professions, sometimes llie military, as in the best days ot 
Rome, with its m.isterly civil engineers; sometimes the 
clergy, ever distiiiguislied for their learning and love of 
rural pursuits, and at otlie r.s, educated physicians, judges, 
lawyers, naturalists, poets, historians, editors, chemists 
and geolo^jists, have in turn, or jointly, contributed most 
to the advanc.emetit of agricultural knowledge. More 
recently, men trained to thoroug!) busin ss habits as mer- 
chants, manuficturers, an i mechanics, carrying their 
energy and methodical actions into agriculture, with no 
trailiiional errors to warp their better ju Igemeiil, have 
done mu.-h to infuse new. life, more system, and greater 
econo ny of labor into all firming oper-Ations. Agricul 
tural progress is largely indebted to inventors ofimproved 
implemenis and machines— to such men as WriiTNKY, 
Fcu.to.v, McCormick, Arkwright, and others, who have 
augmented the mechanical power of human muscles a 
thousand told. So uunierous and extetisive are agricul 
tural machines, and so many keen intellecus are constant 
Iv engaged in making new inventions, and improvements 
on old ones, that it rt quires no inconsiderable study to 
keep pace with the machinery, implement, and tool de 
partmeiii of our profession. Having had charge of the 
Agricultural Defiartment of the Patent Office four year.s, 
iTiy opportunities of knowing' something ofihe progress of 
inventions in this line have been ample. 
Mdimres have for ages I'een so unwisely managed that 
their loss in contamin.ating the atuiospliere, and olFending 
the nostrils of persons, has brought them into bad odor for 
popular discussion. Regarded as tlie natural food ofplanis 
and as a part ofihe wise, economy of Providence, there is 
nothing offensive in their nature, when rightly u.sed, or 
properly considered More may be done for Southern 
agriculture in this department than in any other; for it is 
now generally and sadly neglected. It open.s up a wide 
field fir experiment and research. When one raises ten 
barrels nr fifty buslie.ls of corn upon an acre, how much 
ol the .sub.--ia lice of tlie soil is nece.-'sarily consumed in the 
growth of such a croi,' ? If the soil lo.>,es nothing of its 
elem -Mts .of corn plant.s in tlieir gro>vth then manure 
woiil l seliiom, ifev'er, lie required. All experience goes 
to prove iliat tdla^^e and the prodncuon of ciO[>s, taken 
from die Ian I, mipiir its friiitl'.iltie>s ; mid diat the appli- 
cation of manure reiio vales tlie land again. 
Farmers are al mgi-tlier indebted to chrin;>ts fur wbaC 
they Kii"V/ (■.fcfc, cii.isniuent ehciu iits of mamiie., ami of 
l:m rtlad e V .!;ic of caci> eon-iitiient. The fir.st used'nl 
laci brought to light i.y cl'M-mieal miaiysis, is the large per 
c. in ig!- ot .'•im.de water in all st ii.ie amJ common yard 
mmmre Fn i.u 75 to rd) per <'eiit of -stuiile manure is 
nothing but water, as it ts usu My hauled into fields. sC' 
that a tanner who applies five lo.ios of nominal manure te 
his Ifind. really gives it (bur loads of simple water and one 
of solids. It ihe.se. sohd.s he examined c.heinicaliy. nearly 
one half tfieir weight turns out to be ecthing but the ede 
inent-s of water, or pure oxygen and iiydrogen in an or- 
ganize. 1 condition. Ofthe other half of the load of solid 
manure, about four fifths are simple carlton, or the sub- 
stance that appears as coal when wood, straw, or grain is 
slowly charred with the atmosphere mostly excluded ia. 
the process. 
While water, the elements of water, and carbon are large 
and indispens ible constituents in the growth of all plants, 
abimdaHt experiments prove them not to have a high mar- 
ket value as manure. It a farmer had to purchase water 
and carbon to make hi.s crops, they would cost him, at leas£ 
five tinie.s more ilian they riow do ; and one reason why se 
few acres cultivated iu cotton, corn and other small graitts, 
are artificially fertilized, is the V‘ealc7iess of the fertilizing 
power ofa ton o^’home made manure. It is sold at die 
livery stables in Atnens at fifty cents a load ; and I dcHtbC 
whetlier it would pay a belter profit to give sixty doilars 
tor 120 tons of ibis domestic article to lie hauled three 
miles and over, (the distance of my land fiom this place) 
tlian to pay sixty dollars for a single ton ol’ the best Pi-ru- 
vi.m gurno. Why a ton of one kind ofmrinure is worth, 
from fifty to one hundred times more than a like weight 
(if another kind is an irnportanf agricultural problem which 
will beiullyand sarLfictorily explained hereafter. 
It is well to consider a jilantation in the character of a 
factory, where cerrain raw materials are consumed in the 
production of staples of great domestic and commercial 
value. No planter, nor otheT person, has the power t<s 
create a single atom of matter for any purpose whattvetg 
In studying the growth of plants and animabs, it is impor- 
tant to keep this fact constantly in mind; for every par- 
ticle of matter that forms the whole weight and substance 
of every living being, whetlier animal or vegetable, has an. 
existence i*elore its organization. Something is newer 
made or grown from nothing; and to secure the wonder' 
ful uniformity in different races and families of plants and. 
animals, without impairing their infinite diversity, it k 
oiivious that all tliese organized beings are governed by 
immutable laws. Their systems cari neither add to, nor 
diminish the elements out of wfiich their bodies are fbim- 
ed ; nor can they transform one elementary sulistance, 
like carbon or oxygen, into another, like nitrogen, or 
phosphorus. Hence the presence of any one, two, or 
three of the necessary ingredients to firm the most lux- 
uriant crops avails nothing so long as the oilier equally 
iiidisfiensable elements are absent from the soil Although, 
tlie analysis of soils as hitherto generally practiced, has 
not disclosed so much knowledge that could be turned to 
an immediate practical account, as some sanguine persona 
have expected, yet the subject is by no means exhausted. 
To be of great practical advantage, analyses should be as 
prolonged from month to month, as plants as are in grow- 
ing, and as nature is in feeding them. She takes centurieE 
to separate from their mineral compounds, the potash, 
soda, magnesia and lime found in the ashes offorest trees. 
'I’liese ashes never all existed, in an available condition, 
at any one time in the soil. They were gradually separ- 
ated from their before insoluble silicates and rendered sc- 
Inble as needed from year to year, to perpetuate the annu- 
al growth of ihe giants of the vegetable kingdom. Soiie 
should be iuvestigated with equal patience and minutenesc^^ 
