1846. 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
299 
The difficulty of arriving at a correct practical con¬ 
clusion, in relation to the quantity of nutriment in grain 
and other food by analysis, will be evident from the 
fact, abundantly proved by some of the best farmers in 
New-England as well as in Western New-York, that 
corn ground and boiled with water, is more effective in 
fattening hogs, than twice the amount fed in the dry 
grain. 
Analysis, in other cases, will show the comparative 
value of different varieties of the same grain. A very 
valuable ingredient in wheat is gluten; of this, French 
wheat has been found to contain 12 per cent.; Bavarian, 
24 per cent. H. Davy obtained 19 per cent, from win¬ 
ter, and 24 from summer wheat; from Sicilian, 21, and 
from Barbary wheat, 19 per cent. But the uncertainty 
of permanent dependance on such analysis is proved by 
the fact that the nature of the soil may considerably in¬ 
fluence the result. Hermbstsedt found that the same 
wheat which, with vegetable manure only, gave scarce¬ 
ly 10 per cent, of gluten, yielded more than three times 
as much when manured with powerful animal substan¬ 
ces, rich in ammonia. Some varieties of the potato are 
found to contain more starch than other varieties; and 
this quantity is also controlled to some extent by soil. 
The analysis of plants will also indicate what plants 
are best to employ as manure by plowing in the green 
crop. A considerable portion of nitrogen is essential 
to the growth of wheat. Now clover is also found to 
contain a large portion; hence a crop of clover becomes 
eminently useful as manure for this grain. Wheat ab¬ 
stracts its nitrogen chiefly from the soil, and is con¬ 
sequently exhausting; clover obtains it mostly from the 
air, and is not exhausting, but becomes in this way the 
provider for the wants of the wheat. 
Analysis has also proved that in addition to the usual 
organic elements, there are about ten organic or earthy 
constituents, most of which are invariably found in the 
same species, and are indispensable to its healthy 
growth. These are potash, soda, lime, magnesia, alu¬ 
mina, silica, iron, manganese, sulphur, phosphorus, 
and chlorine. These substances are derived by the 
plants from the soil; hence a fertile soil,—one from 
which plants may draw these essential constituents, 
must of course contain them. Here the intimate rela¬ 
tion between the constituents of plants and of soils is at 
once obvious. Hence soils which are destitute of a 
part of these ingredients, or contain them in very small 
proportions, is necessarily sterile; or if they be desti¬ 
tute of one only, the same result must take place, if that 
one is an essential ingredient of the crop growing upon 
them.* * And here it is that the great benefits to be de¬ 
rived from analysis of soils, at once force themselves 
upon the mind. Ifasoilis barren, determine its con¬ 
stituents—see what is wanting—what is in excess; ap¬ 
ply at once the deficient, ingredient, or counteract or 
neutralize the injurious one, and fertility is restored. 
A soil was shown to H. Davy, which, though apparent¬ 
ly abounding in every enriching material, was incapa¬ 
ble of yielding a crop. He found by examination, that 
it was poisoned by a considerable portion of sulphate of 
iron or copperas. He decomposed this sulphate by ap¬ 
plying lime, and the difficulty was removed. Here the 
remedy was simple and certain: but such cases very 
rarely occur in practice. 
As different plants draw from the soil the same sub¬ 
stances in unlike proportions, analyses of these plants 
that radian corn, ground and boiled, will fatten hogs more than 
twice as fast as the same amount of raw material. 
* Those plants, says C. W. Johnson, which yield salt, never 
grow well on lands which do not contain it; those in which 
carbonate of lime is found never flourish in soils from which 
this is absent. Plants which abound with nitrate of potash, such 
as the sun-flower and the nettle, always languish in soils free 
from that salt; but when watered with a weak solution of it, their 
growth is very materially promoted, and saltpetre is then found in 
them, upon analysis, in very sensible proportion. The same wri¬ 
ter states, that an old pasture became, m spite of various liberal 
lop dressings of different manures, incapable of producing a luxu¬ 
riant crop. At last peat ashes were found to produce the best re¬ 
sult, or an increase of more than a ton of hay per acre. These 
peat ashes were found to contain one-eighth of their weight of 
gypsum, which was the ingredient the soil needed. Gypsum 
itself was then applied with the same successful result. 
will show which substances are most largely needed 
for the different crops. And it points out a reason of 
the fact long since known, that a field which may bear 
a profitable crop of one kind, may be unable to yield a 
good return of another; and that by alternation or ro¬ 
tation, different portions are variously abstracted, and 
time left for the restoration of each by various processes 
in nature, and by artificial means. But the fact that 
these ingredients vary in the same plants, shows the 
great necessity of caution in drawing practical conclu¬ 
sions. Justus Liebig, one of the most eminent chemists 
of modern times, but whose deductions are often defi¬ 
cient in value from a want of sufficient corroboration by 
actual experiment in cultivation, says that one hundred 
parts of the stalks of wheat yield 1.55 parts of inorga¬ 
nic constituents; barley 8.54 parts; and oats only 4.42 
parts, all being of the same composition. “We have 
in these facts, 5 ’ he then adds, *' f a clear proof of what 
plants require for their growth. Upon the same field 
which will yield only one harvest of wheat, two crops 
of barley and three of oats may be raised. 55 But every 
good farmer knows that oats is exhausting to an extraor¬ 
dinary degree, instead of being less so than barley, and 
only one-third as much as wheat, according to this con¬ 
clusion of Liebig. Some of the best farmers of New- 
York, never suffer an oat crop to grow on land ever ap¬ 
propriated to wheat. Professor Johnston has, however, 
demolished Liebig’s reasoning, by showing that these 
inorganic constituents are not only different in compo¬ 
sition, but greatly variable in quantity, the oats some¬ 
times considerably exceeding the barley, and the wheat 
varying from 3.5 per cent, to 15.5 per cent. But 
neither of these chemists appear to have considered 
the composition of the grain , nor to have remembered 
the difference in the vjeight of the crop. Superficial 
reasoning and general theories often appear beautiful; 
but thorough investigation in detail, and the results of 
actual practice, will frequently exhibit their uncertainty 
and error. 
A department of analysis, perhaps the least liable to 
erroneous results, is the examination of manures. Fer¬ 
tilizing substances are known by their effects applied 
separately to plants or in mixture; or by the fact that 
fertile soils and well grown plants are found to contain 
them. Now, analysis will show what proportion of 
the fertilizing materials exist, in different kinds of ma¬ 
nure; and hence the value of manures may be ascer¬ 
tained, at least to some extent, by a previous chemical 
examination. A comparison of common manure with 
guano, exhibits this principle in a striking light: 
A ton of manure yields 2 pounds and 4 ounces of potash. 
cc 
guano 
CC 
66 
“ 
8 
CC 
a 
& manure 
CC 
1 
CC 
10 
CC 
soda. 
ff * 
* guano 
U 
36 
CC 
15 
CC 
a 
ff 
manure 
CC 
5 
CC 
1 
CC 
phosph. a^id, 
a 
guano 
CC 
283 
< c 
9 
CC 
a 
a 
manure 
CC 
1 
CC 
4 
CC 
sulph. acid. 
a 
guano 
CC 
93 
CC 
8 
CC r 
CC 
a 
manure 
CC 
1 
CC 
9 
CC 
chlorine. 
a 
guano 
CC 
62 
CC 
00 
(C 
‘f * 
Here it will be seen that most of these enriching in¬ 
gredients are from thirty to 70 times as great in quan¬ 
tity in guano as in common manure. Experiment ac¬ 
cordingly proves that guano often produces from thirty 
to seventy times as great a growth in plants, as an equal 
quantity of manure. 
One of the most powerful manures s poudrette, a 
preparation from night-soil. Let us see what kind of 
comparison analysis will draw between this substance 
and guano: 
A ton of night-soil yields 6 pounds 7 oz. of potash 
a 
guano 
CC 
66 
ff 
8 
if ff 
u 
night-soil 
CC 
4 
a 
10 
ee soda. 
a 
guano 
CC 
36 
a 
15 
CC CC 
{( 
night-soil 
CC 
120 
a 
phosph. acid 
a 
guano 
CC 
283 
a 
9 
CC CC * 
Here we see that guano still vastly exceeds even 
night-soil in these important requisites to fertility; 
* London Ag. Gazette. 
