aan 
| 
an excess of nitric acid. Whatever is not thus dis- 
solved is chloride of silver, and ought to be separated 
by filtration: on adding then weak water of potash 
(not ammonia) cautiously to the filtered liquid, the 
pure phosphate of silver will be obtained, without 
any alumina or iron, provided the liquid be still 
acidulous in a slight degree. It ought to be remem- 
bered that chloride of silver falls in a white curdy 
form, quite different from that of the phosphate of 
silver. The portion of soil used for this experiment 
should be fresh, and not calcined, because the phos- 
phates, when ignited, afford white precipitates with 
salts of silver. The stronger the solution of the 
phosphoric saline compound is, the more character- 
istic is the yellow precipitate with silver; and then 
ammonia may be used for effecting the partial satu- 
ration of the acid excess. Sulphate of magnesia is 
an excellent re-agent for detecting phosphoric acid, 
and for separating it from the above acid solution, 
when it is partially neutralized with ammonia; for 
the magnesia forms, with the phosphoric acid and 
ammonia, the insoluble granular precipitate of am- 
monia-magnesian phosphate. A solution of sulphate 
of magnesia, containing a little sal-ammoniac, is pro- 
bably the best test-liquor for detecting phosphates in 
faintly acidulous, but still better in neutral, solutions. 
In almost all soils of an arable nature under cultiva- 
tion in this country, there is a sufficiency of calca- 
reous matter present to counteract the combination 
of phosphoric acid with alumina or oxide of iron, for 
which reason it would be an idle refinement of agri- 
eultural analysis to search for phosphates of alumina 
andiron. As for manganese, often associated with 
iron, it exists in too small a proportion, and is pos- 
sessed of too little value to make it worth while to 
effect its separation. It gives to calcined iron-oxide 
a black hue, and is characterized in its saline solu- 
tions by the flesh-coloured precipitate which it affords 
with hydro-sulphuret of ammonia, after the whole of 
the iron has been thrown down by boiling the solu- 
tion of the two metals with pure carbonate of lime. 
«¢ The organic matter in any soil may be correctly 
- estimated by calcining its powder pretty strongly till 
the carbonic acid be expelled from the lime in it. 
The loss of weight, deducting that due to the car- 
bonic acid gas (which is known from an independent 
experiment), gives the quantity of organic matter. 
Its quality is determined by the ultimate analysis by 
means of hydrate of soda and quicklime, as previ- 
ously stated.” 
Lyell’s Principles of Geology.—De La Beche’s 
Geology.—Philip’s Geology.—Johnston’s Lectures 
on Agricultural Chemistry.—Davy’s Agricultural 
Chemistry by Shier.—Lnebig’s Chemistry of Agri- 
culture.— Chaptal’s Chemistry of Agriculture — 
Annals of Agriculture—Communications to the 
Board of Agriculture.—Young’s Farmer's Guide. 
—Goodrich Smith’s Economy of Farming.—Dr. 
Dickson’s System of Practical Agriculture —Sir 
John Sinclair’s Code of Agriculture—Sir John 
Sinclatr’s General Report of Scotland. — Potts’s 
Farmer's Cyclopedia.—Hunter’s Georgical Essays. 
—Sproule’s Treatise on Agriculture—Buel’s Far- 
mer’s Instructor—Transactions of the Highland 
Society.— Quarterly Journal of Agriculture.—Jour- 
nal of the Royal Agricultural Society of England. 
SOILING. The feeding of live stock in sum- 
mer with green food, cut daily, and given to 
them in houses, stalls, or yards. It is not suit- 
able for young or growing animals, who require 
a moderate degree of exercise in the fields in 
order to the maintaining of health and vigour, — 
SOILING. 
269 
nor for most of the live stock of farms which are 
so extensive that the daily carrying of the green 
food from the comparatively distant fields would 
involve too great an expense; but it is well 
suited for the final feeding of cattle on all suffi- 
ciently convenient farms,—for the ordinary feed- 
ing of working horses and working oxen, whose 
time is too valuable to allow of their slowly 
grazing in the field,—for the feeding of hogs and 
other miner stock, who do harm by roaming | 
abroad,—and for the feeding of milch cows on all 
small country farms, town dairy farms, and cot- 
tier’s plots or allotments. “It is not very general- 
ly adopted in British husbandry,” says Mr. Rham, 
“it being so much easier to allow the cattle to 
crop their food in the pastures; but in those coun- 
tries where property in land is greatly subdivided, 
and where farms are small and good pasture 
scarce, as in Flanders, France, and Switzerland, | 
especially where the vineyards render manure 
scarce and dear by taking a considerable portion 
of it and returning none, there the soiling of 
cattle is almost a matter of necessity. A cow or 
ox requires from two to three acres of pasture or 
meadow to feed it all the year round, allowing a | 
portion for hay. But by raising clover, lucern, | 
sainfoin, tares, and other green crops, three cows | 
or more can be fed with the produce of one acre, | 
especially if a portion is in turnips or other 
succulent roots. 
crops is converted into excellent manure, and the 
land kept in a state of fertility.” The system is 
admirably adapted to the existing state of the 
greater part of Ireland, and, if generally adopted, 
would materially assist to relieve the prevailing 
penury of the small farmers of that country ; and 
it is also well suited to many middle-sized and 
even large farms in all parts of Britain, where the 
supplies of manure are scanty or costly, or where 
the circumstances of soil and situation would pro- 
duce the highest profit from a maximum growth 
of corn,—and it c¢ould be sufficiently well accom- 
modated to the carrying conveniences of any 
extensive farm to which it is otherwise emi- 
nently suitable, by the erection of houses or 
Thus the straw of the white | 
sheds for the cattle in different and mutually | 
distant localities. 
One advantage of soiling, is the addition to 
the health, strength, and secretions or flesh of 
the animals, resulting from regularity and ful- 
ness of feeding, from the absence of all interrup- 
tion and inconvenience in feeding, and from su- 
perior protection from the heat of the sun and 
the harassing attacks of flies—Another advan- 
tage is the economising of food, by the preven- 
tion of waste in the use of it, by the growing of 
kinds which are far bulkier and more nourishing 
than any crops of grass, and by the saving of 
land for the production of the costlier sorts of 
food suitable for the use of man. Any given 
superficies of land has been proved, by many, 
various, and careful experiments, to feed from 
two to five or six times more cattle in the soiling 
