THE CULTIVATOR. 
31 
BSE 
the hand, and the eye dark and dead, will be a sluggish worker, and 
an unprofitable feeder. Those, however, that are of a yellow co¬ 
lour, are said to be subject to sleat (diarrhoea.) 
Science of Agriculture. 
OF THE USES OF THE SOILS TO VEGETABLES. 
Soils affords to plants a fixed abode and medium of nourishment. 
Earths, exclusive of organized matter (animal and vegetable sub¬ 
stances,) and water, are allowed by most physiologists to be of no 
other use to plants, than that of supporting them, or furnishing a 
medium by which they may fix themselves to the globe. But earths 
and organic matters, that is, soils, afford at once support and food. 
The pure earths merely act as mechanical and indirect chemical 
agents in the soil. —The earths consists of metals united to oxygen, 
(a constituent of the atmosphere) and these metals have not been 
decomposed; there is consequently no reason to suppose that the 
earths are convertible into the elements of organized compounds, 
that is, into carbon, hydrogen and azote, (three substances which 
make up the bulk of all plants.) Plants have been made to grow in 
given quantities of earth. They consume very small portions only; 
and what is lost may be accounted for by the quantities found in the 
ashes : that is to say, it has not been converted into any new pro¬ 
duct. The carbonic acid united to lime or magnesia, if any strong¬ 
er acid happens to be found in the soil during the fermentation of 
vegetable matter, which will disengage it from the earths, may be 
decomposed ; but the earths themselves cannot be supposed conver¬ 
tible into other substances, by any process taking place in the soil. 
In all cases the ashes of plants contain some of the earths of the soil 
in which they grew, but these earths, as has been ascertained by 
the earths afforded by different plants, never equal more than one- 
fiftieth of the weight of the plant consumed. If they be considered 
as necessary to the vegetable, it is as giving hardness and firmness 
to its organization. Thus it has been mentioned that wheat, oats, 
and many of the hollow stalked grasses, have an epidermis [outer 
bark] principally of silicious earth ; the use of which seems to be to 
strengthen them, and defend them from the attacks of insects and 
parasytical [which grow and feed upon others] plants. 
The true nourishment of plants is water, and decomposing organic 
matter, [rotted vegetable and animal substances]; both these exist 
in soils, not in pure earths : but the earthy parts of the soil are use¬ 
ful in retaining water, so as to supply it in the proper proportions to 
the roots of the vegetables, and they are likewise efficacious in pro¬ 
ducing the proper distribution of the animal or vegetable matter. 
When equally mixed with it they prevent it decomposing too rapidly, 
and by their means the soluble parts are supplied in proper propor¬ 
tions. 
The soil is necessary to the existence of plants, both as affording 
them nourishment, and enabling them to fix themselves in such a 
manner as to obey those laws by which their radicles are kept be¬ 
low the surface, and their leaves exposed to the free atmosphere. 
As the system of roots, branches, and leaves, are very different in 
different vegetables, so they flourish most in different soils; the 
plants that have bulbous roots require a looser and lighter soil than 
such as have fibrous roots ; and the plants possessing only short fi¬ 
brous radicles demand a firmer soil than such as have tap-roots or 
extensive lateral roots. 
The constituent parts of the soil which give tenacity and coherence are 
the finely divided matters; and they possess the power of giving those 
qualities in the highest degree when they contain much alumina. 
A small quantity of finely divided matter is sufficient to fit a soil for 
the production of turnips and barley; and a tolerable crop of turnips 
has been produced on a soil containing eleven parts out of twelve 
sand. A much greater proportion of sand, however, always produ¬ 
ces absolute sterility. Vegetable or animal matters, when finely 
divided, not only give coherence, but likewise soltness and penetra¬ 
bility ; but neither they nor any other part of the soil must be in too 
great proportion; and a soil is unproductive if it consists entirely of 
impalpable matters. Pure alumina or silica, pure carbonate of lime, 
or carbonate of magnesia, are incapable of supporting healthy vege¬ 
tation ; and no soil is fertile that contains as much as nineteen parts 
out of twenty of any of these constituents. 
A certain degree of friability or looseness of texture is also required 
in soils, in order that the operations of culture may be easily con¬ 
ducted ; that moisture may have free access to the fibres of the 
roots, that heat may be readily conveyed to them, and that evapora-1 
tion may proceed without obstruction. These are commonly attain¬ 
ed by the presence of sand. As alumina possesses all the properties 
of adhesiveness in an eminent degree, and silex those of friability, it 
is obvious that a mixture of these two earths, in suitable proportions, 
would furnish every thing wanted to form the most perfect soil as to 
water and the operations of culture. In a soil so compounded, water 
will be presented to the roots by capillary attraction. It will be sus¬ 
pended in it, in the same manner as it is suspended in a sponge, not 
in a state of aggregation, but minute division, so that every part may 
be said to be moist, but not wet.— [Grisenthwaite. 
The power of the soil to absorb water by cohesive attraction depends 
in great measure upon the state of division of its parts; the more 
divided they are, the greater is their absorbent power. The diffe¬ 
rent constituent parts of soils likewise appear to act, even by cohe¬ 
sive attraction, with different degrees of energy. Thus vegetable 
substances seem to be more absorbent than animal substances; ani¬ 
mal substances more so than compounds of alumina and silica ; and 
compounds of alumina and silica more absorbent than carbonates of 
lime and magnesia ; these differences may, however, possibly depend 
upon the differences in their state of division, and upon the surface 
exposed. 
The power of soil to absorb water from air is much connected with 
fertility. When this power is great, the plant is supplied with mois¬ 
ture in dry seasons ; and the effect of evaporation in the day is coun¬ 
teracted by the absorption of the aqueous vapor from the atmos¬ 
phere, by the interior parts of the soil during the day, and by both 
the exterior and interior during the night. The stiff clays approach¬ 
ing to pipe clays in their nature, which take up the greatest quanti¬ 
ty of water when it is poured upon them in a fluid form, are not the 
soils which absorb most moisture from the atmosphere in dry wea¬ 
ther. They cake and present only a small surface to the air ; and the 
vegetation on them is generally burnt up almost as readily as on tlfe 
sands. The soils which are most efficient in supplying the plant 
with water by atmospheric absorption, are those in which there is a 
due mixture of sand, finely divided clay, and carbonate of lime, with 
some animal or vegetable matter, and which are so loose and light 
as to be freely permeable to the atmosphere. With respect to this 
quality, carbonate of lime, and animal and vegetable matter are of 
great use in soils ; they give absorbent power to the soil without 
likewise giving it tenacity; sand, which also destroys tenacity, on 
the contrary, gives little absorbent power. The absorbent power of 
soils, with respect to atmospheric moisture, is always greatest in 
most fertile soils; so that it affords one method of judgino- of the 
productiveness of land. 
As examples of the absorbent powers of soils: One thousand parts 
of a celebrated soil from Ormiston, in East Lothian, which contain¬ 
ed more than half is weight of finely divided matter, ot which eleven 
parts were carbonate of lime, and nine parts vegetable matter, when 
dried at two hundred and twelve degrees, gained in an hour by ex¬ 
posure to the air saturated with moisture, at a temperature of sixty- 
two degrees, eighteen grains. One thousand parts of a very fertile 
soil from the banks of the river Parret, in Somersetshire, under the 
same circumstances, gained sixteen grains. One thousand parts ot 
a soil from Mersea, in Essex, gained thirteen grains. One thousand 
grains of a fine sand, from Essex, gained eleven grains. One thou¬ 
sand of a coarse sand gained only eight grains. One thousand of a 
soil of Bagshot Heath, gained only three grains. 
Horaseltolel AiFalrs. 
_ Mr. Cultivator —As household economy comes within thcTpur- 
view of your duties, I hope you will permit me to trouble you with 
an occasional communication upon this subject; for farmers wives, 
as well as farmers, are capable of deriving benefit and instruction 
from each other’s experience. I shall begin with. 
My method of Cooking a Calve's-head. —First of all get the head, 
pluck and trotters of a. good calf, and have them nicely cleaned, so 
that there is not a hair to be seen upon them. Cut open the head 
and take out the brains. Then boil the head, feet and haslet, till all 
the bones will freely separate from the flesh, in a goodly quantity of 
water, and without salt. After which, take out the bones, and di¬ 
vide the meat, &c. into three parts, in the proportions that may be 
desired. Take one portion, cover and set it by the fire, where it 
will keep waim, to be served up plain, and to be eaten with drawn 
butter and vegetables. Chop fine some fat salt pork and veal from 
the leg, in the proportion of four of veal to one of pork, season with 
