316 AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. [Idly, 
(Prepared arid engraved expressly for the American Agriculturist.) 
The Editor with his Young Readers. 
Scenes like this in the picture, are now common 
in all parts of the loyal States. Yousee the soldier 
has been wounded in the leg, and is now so far re¬ 
covered that he'can walk with his crutch. He is a* 
sergeant in his regiment, and has got home to his 
family, where he is explaining to his parents, and to 
his wife and children, the scenes of the battle. The 
newspaper ffiap is spread out upon the table, and 
with the stem of his pipe, he is showing “ how fields 
were won.” You see by the picture of General 
Scott upon the wall, and the cannon that little 
Robie is drawing upon the floor, that military edu¬ 
cation has been going on in the family during the 
father’s absence. There stands a future soldier of 
the Republic. How he drinks in every word of his 
father’s story, and enters into his sympathies ! Will 
he not always love the dear old flag under which his 
father fought, and his heart thrill to the music of 
the Star Spangled- Banner ? What seeds of patriot¬ 
ism and hatted to treason are now being sown in 
young hearts all over the land! The wife is well 
pleased to see the head of the household home 
again, though he comes bearing the wounds of bat¬ 
tle—scars that he must carry with him to his grave. 
She is proud to have borne a part in the sacrifices, 
by which the land of their fathers, or of their adop¬ 
tion, has been rescued from its perils. 
One of the good things to come out of this war 
is the cementing of the nation into one homoge¬ 
neous people. The miserable jealousy towards for¬ 
eigners will be cured. Almost every European na¬ 
tionality is represented in our armies, and their 
blood has been poured out as freely as that of the 
older citizens of the Republic. All have stood to¬ 
gether in the presence of a common danger, and 
have been made children of a common country, by 
a baptism of blood. The seal can never be effaced, 
and will never be forgotten. 
Alas ! for the homes to whom the soldier will 
never return. For them there is no tale of triumph 
from the lips they love, but loneliness and grief, 
for which there is no solace but in God, and in ex¬ 
alted patriotism. 
Sometltiiig Al»out Chemistry— III. 
(Continued from, page 184.) 
Our young readers will remember that we told 
them, on page 183, about Water, that it was com¬ 
posed of two gaseous or air-like elements, oxygen 
and hydrogen; about the Air, which is a mixture 
of oxygen and nitrogen, chiefly; about the gas 
called Carbonic acid., which is formed when charcoal, 
or any thing which contains carbon, is burned in 
the air or in oxygen, and a little about Ammonia, 
composed of nitrogen and hydrogen. Now these 
substances, except the air, are compound bodies, 
the elements of which are united by chemical affin¬ 
ity. Affinity means the power which unites ele¬ 
ments or compound bodies, so that two unlike sub¬ 
stances form a new one unlike themselves, and in 
doing so, always combine in the same proportions. 
Thus when oxygen and hydrogen combine to form 
water, 8 parts (that may be 8 ounces, or 8 pounds, 
or any weight,) of oxygen unite with 1 part of hy¬ 
drogen. AVhen oxygen and carbon unite to form 
carbonic acid, 8 parts of oxygen unite with 12 parts 
of carbon, and so on. This is very different from 
mixing things together. We’may mixsalt and mus¬ 
tard, and oil and vinegar, and they make a salad 
dressing; but we know that each of the ingredients 
is still unchanged, for we taste each one in the mix¬ 
ture. In mixtures there may be more or less of 
either of the things mixed; but when things unite 
chemically, it requires a certain definite quantity of 
each. We told you that oxygen combined with 
iron, and formed iron rust, or oxide of iron Now 
in iron rust we perceive no oxygen, neither do we 
perceive any iron. 18 parts of iron united with 8 
parts of oxygen; both the iron and the oxygen 
have disappeared, and we have red iron-rust, a new 
substance in all its relations. So it is with all chemi¬ 
cal combinations, and this is the difference between 
mixed substances and compound bodies, whether. 
they be solid, liquid, or gaseous. 
The air, we have said, is composed of about one- 
fifth oxygen, and four-fifths nitrogen. This is a 
mixture, and the nitrogen softens the oxygen just 
as oil softens the vinegar and mustard in the salad 
