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UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 ANDREW 
 
 SMITH 
 
 HALLIDIC: 
 
ON THE 
 
 SCIENCE OF AGRICULTURE 
 
 COMPRISING 
 
 A COMMENTARY ON AND COMPARATIVE INVESTIGATION 
 OF THE 
 
 AGRICULTURAL CHEMISTRY 
 
 OF 
 
 MR, KIRWAN AND SIR HUMPHRY DAVY; 
 
 THE 
 
 CODE QF AGRICULTURE 
 
 OF 
 
 SIR JOHN SINCLAIR, SIR JOSEPH BANKS, AND OTHER 
 AUTHORS ON THE SUBJECT. 
 
 SHEWING, 
 
 That there is not only a discrepance in the opinions of those Authors on many 
 of the most important operations of Agriculture ; but that this arises from their 
 inferences and conclusions being erroneous ; and their principles unfounded, or 
 inapplicable ; and particularly on the subject of breeding, and the nature, 
 preparation, and application of manures. And also of the rust or black blight in 
 wheat ; of which the true cause, and its preventive are here explained. 
 
 DeUicateti to ti>e 
 
 BY JOSEPH HAYWARD, 
 
 AUTHOR OF THE SCIENCE OF HORT1CULTUJ 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED FOR 
 
 LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, BROWN, AND GREEN, 
 
 PATERNOSTER-ROW 
 
 1825. 
 

 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 Printed by A. & R. Spottiswoode, 
 New- Street- Square . 
 
ADVERTISEMENT AND 
 DEDICATION. 
 
 AFTER the numerous books of late pub- 
 lished on the subject of agriculture, and 
 particularly those of Mr. Kirwan, Sir Hum- 
 phry Davy, Sir John Sinclair, Sir Joseph 
 Bankes, and others, another may appear 
 superfluous ; but all who have read those 
 different authors with attention, must have 
 been convinced that however elaborate their 
 works, there is such a discrepancy in their 
 opinions on some of the most important 
 operations of agriculture, as to justify an 
 attempt to bring them to the .test of 
 a just investigation and comparison, by 
 tracing their principles in their progress 
 from cause to effect. I am not a pro- 
 fessor of chemistry, nor an extensive 
 A 2 
 
 108567 
 
IV ADVERTISEMENT 
 
 practical agriculturist, nor the member 
 of any learned society : and as it is the 
 fashion of the times to attach great import- 
 ance to such authority, some may consider 
 me arrogant, presumptuous, and invidious, 
 in attempting to intrude on the public my 
 commentaries on the works of such estab- 
 lished characters : but I disclaim any other 
 intention, than that of ascertaining and 
 establishing just principles, and I cannot 
 hope to induce any one to adopt my notions 
 in preference to others, unless I prove 
 theirs to be wrong. My ideas on the sci- 
 ence of horticulture have long been before 
 the public ; and the critics remarked on that 
 work, that I was more bold than politic : 
 but what sort of policy must it be to deter 
 an Englishman from appearing as the ad- 
 vocate of truth and science ? If they mean 
 that by my boldness in endeavouring to 
 point out what I conceived to be the errors 
 of others, and to rectify that which I had 
 proved to be bad in practice, I lost the 
 patronage of the Horticultural Society of 
 London, they may be correct j for this, as a 
 
AND DEDICATION. V 
 
 body, I certainly could not obtain, although 
 previous to the publication of that work, I 
 privately submitted the same to some of 
 the first public characters, and particularly 
 to Sir Humphry Davy, and to the president 
 and council of the Horticultural Society. 
 Sir Humphry very politely received and 
 acknowledged the perusal of my papers, 
 and with great liberality stated his admis- 
 sion, that to that part of my work which 
 related to the objects of his peculiar study, 
 he found no objection ; at the same time 
 excusing himself from giving an opinion 
 on the practical part, by observing, he did 
 not consider himself possessed of sufficient 
 practical knowledge to give it importance, 
 and expressed his intention to commend me 
 to the president of the Horticultural Society. 
 I dedicated my book to the president and 
 society, and repeatedly applied to them for 
 their opinion, and invited them to an in- 
 vestigation of my demonstrations, but which 
 they uniformly refused ! Nearly six years 
 have now elapsed, and I have never seen 
 any comment of his or theirs on it: however. 
 
VI ADVERTISEMENT 
 
 the public having done me the honour to 
 have purchased the first edition, and good 
 part of the second, assures me it cannot 
 now be suppressed ; and whether the im- 
 provements I had established, were or were 
 not received and treated as they deserved, 
 time will show. Every man has a right to 
 confide in his own understanding, and if 
 his conscience does not accuse him of having 
 presumed to violate truth, or pluming him- 
 self on his fancied powers, to have imposed 
 false and untried theories on the ignorant 
 and credulous, he need not fear others. 
 Fortune may enable pride and arrogance to 
 smother truth and science for a time, but 
 in a land of liberty these must ultimately 
 establish themselves, however humble their 
 immediate patrons. Although the Horti- 
 cultural Society of London have refused to 
 
 \ acknowledge the merit of my arrangement 
 
 and explanation of scientific principles, 
 
 they must ultimately adopt them, or be 
 
 \ left far in the back ground, and their gar- 
 
 , den exhibit a glaring instance of a want 
 
 of candour and liberality in the directors. 
 
 20 
 
AND DEDICATION. Vll 
 
 Repeated observation and demonstrative 
 experiments have convinced me, that al- 
 though Sir Humphry Davy's analysis, and 
 expositions of chemical principles, are cor- 
 rect and clear, in his application of them 
 to agricultural practice, and in his infer- 
 ences, he is greatly mistaken. 
 
 That although Sir John Sinclair, is copi- 
 ous and minute in his description of agri- 
 cultural operations and practical results, his 
 opinions and deductions are erroneous and 
 inconclusive. 
 
 That Sir Joseph Bankes, in his opinion 
 and description of the rust or black blight 
 in wheat, has mistaken the effect for the 
 cause, and thus misled the public in their 
 endeavours to find a remedy. 
 
 That Mr. Knight's opinions and exposi- 
 tions, as quoted by Sir John Sinclair and 
 Sir Humphry Davy, are hypothetical and 
 fallacious. 
 
 That Bakewell's principles and practice ^ 
 in breeding, condemned by Sir John Sin- 
 clair, and neglected by the generality of 
 agriculturists, are founded on true scientific 
 
Vlll ADVERTISEMENT 
 
 principles, and are the most correct and 
 beneficial that can be followed. 
 
 That the practice of Jethro Tull and 
 Mr. Curwen is grounded on just scientific 
 principles ; although these are not recog- 
 nised, or not explained by them. 
 
 That the methods in general practice, of 
 preparing and applying manure, are erro- 
 neous and imperfect. 
 
 That by the common mode of making 
 hay, much unnecessary risk and expense 
 are incurred, and the saccharine and nutri- 
 tive principles lessened and dissipated. 
 
 That every county in England may make 
 as good cider as Hereford, Devon, or 
 Somerset; and the apple trees may be 
 trained so as never to be subjected to the 
 injuries of being overloaded with fruit or 
 snow, and without incurring additional ex- 
 pense. 
 
 And that the defects I have described 
 being removed, and the remedies and prac- 
 tices I have explained adopted ; much' in- 
 crease, and more certainty in the produce 
 of the land, may be obtained. 
 
AND DEDICATION. IX 
 
 Then, under such convictions, ought I 
 to fear being censured as obtrusive and 
 presuming, in thus offering myself to the 
 public ? I know, among the practical agri- 
 culturists, it is a prevailing opinion, that 
 no good arises from attending to theorists. 
 To these I will beg leave to observe, that 
 however repeatedly they may have been 
 misled by theory, they cannot be justified 
 in opposing or neglecting science; for whilst 
 ignorant of this, they are mere imitators, 
 and can never be masters of their business. 
 And surely, the nobility and gentry, will 
 not consider a correct knowledge of the 
 relation of effects to their causes, as it 
 regards objects which are not only essential 
 to their happiness, but to their existence, 
 to be beneath their notice ? 
 
 I trust the British public will not con- 
 sider me unworthy their attention, be- 
 cause I have no great man, or body of men, 
 to patronise my work. At any rate, when 
 they consider the result of my having op- 
 posed the theories of a great man in my 
 former work, they will, perhaps, excuse 
 
X ADVERTISEMENT AND DEDICATION. 
 
 me, in thus wishing to avoid mortification, 
 and of relying upon their candour and libe- 
 rality, by dedicating this work to them, of 
 whom I have the honour to be one, 
 
 And their very faithful, 
 
 and humble servant, 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 Advertisement and Dedication - iii 
 
 Introduction -------- i 
 
 General View of the Subject - 5 
 
 On Breeding or Raising Vegetables - - - 9 
 
 On Breeding and Rearing Animals - - - 21 
 
 On Cultivating the Earth ----- 51 
 
 Arrangement of Chemical Principles - - - 71 
 
 On the Roots of Plants ------ 77 
 
 On the Use and Office of the Leaves 82 
 
 On the Food of Plants -.,---- 93 
 
 On the Rust or Black Blight in Wheat - - 156 
 
 On Fallowing Land and Paring and Burning - 169 
 On the Composition of Soils and the Agency 
 
 of the Earths, &c. 189 
 
 On the Nature and Application of Lime - - 195 
 
 On Haymaking - - ----- 208 
 
 On Orchards and Cider - - - - - - 212 
 
UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 AGRICULTURE is defined by Mr. Kirwan to 
 be "the art of making the earth produce the 
 largest crops of useful vegetables at the smallest 
 expense ;" but this conveys only a contracted 
 and partial idea of that which must be compre- 
 hended in the science of husbandry. Vegeta- 
 bles, and animals which feed on vegetables, con- 
 stitute that produce of the earth which is essen- 
 tial to the existence, and requisite to the com- 
 forts, of mankind. The art of husbandry is, no 
 doubt, simple, if it be considered as limited to 
 manual operations only ; but the science of hus- 
 bandry or agriculture is more properly, a know- 
 ledge of the laws of nature which determine 
 the existence of both animals and vegetables, 
 and particularly of those, which influence and 
 govern them in their sexual intercourse and pro- 
 pagation, and also in their feeding, lodging, &c. 
 
2 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Sir Humphry Davy very justly observes, " It 
 is scarcely possible to enter upon any investiga- 
 tion in agriculture without finding it connected, 
 more or less, with doctrines or elucidations de- 
 rived from chemistry." And a chemical examin- 
 ation, shows, that the earth is but little con- 
 cerned in vegetation, otherwise than as a me- 
 dium or vehicle, bed or couch, in and on which, 
 the most important operations of nature are 
 conducted and performed. 
 
 We are commonly led to consider vegetables 
 as the chief produce of the earth ; but vegetables 
 and animals are so completely dependent upon 
 each other, that before we can affect in any de- 
 gree the produce of the one, we must comprehend 
 the influence they have each on the other. From 
 a great similarity to themselves in nature, man- 
 kind were very early enabled to form a clear com- 
 prehension of the general functions of animals, 
 in regard to their food, and as they are influenced 
 by climate ; also, of the difference in the sexes, 
 and the natural result of their intercourse : but it 
 was not understood until a much later period, 
 that the general functions of vegetables are in 
 every respect similar to those of animals, and 
 that the operations of nature regarding both, 
 are regulated by much the same laws j this, how- 
 ever, is now clearly demonstrated. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 3 
 
 As some portions of the earth, in the produc- 
 tion of animals and vegetables, conduce more to 
 the supplying the wants of mankind than others, 
 so are some species of animals and vegetables 
 more productive and eligible than others, and 
 not only one species more so than another, but 
 some varieties of the same species are more valu- 
 able than others ; therefore it must be obvious, 
 that as well as enquiring into the- general nature 
 and various qualities of the earth, we must also 
 enquire into and ascertain, the qualities of those 
 varieties of animals and vegetables which are the 
 most conducive to our wants, and what causes 
 produce those varieties, or diminish or increase 
 their peculiar qualities. But as the qualities which 
 give value to the different varieties of animals and 
 vegetables must depend on peculiar circumstances, 
 it can be of little use in a work like this, to attempt 
 a particular description of these : and although 
 it is obvious, that the physiology of both animals 
 and vegetables form the fundamental principles 
 of the science of husbandry, it does not follow 
 that it must also comprehend a knowledge of the 
 comparative anatomy of either animals or vege- 
 tables ; this is of trifling consequence to the hus- 
 bandman. I shall therefore interfere very little 
 with the departments of zoology or botany. 
 
THE 
 
 SCIENCE OF AGRICULTURE. 
 
 GENERAL VIEW OF THE SUBJECT. 
 
 IT appears that a difference in the species only 
 of animals and vegetables was originally created, 
 and that the different varieties were left to be 
 determined by the casual or accidental com- 
 binations and operations of original principles or 
 causes. In the production of variety in ani- 
 mals and vegetables, no doubt climate has the 
 preponderating influence, and next to this food 
 and lodging ; but in the general course of nature, 
 these three grand principles operate in unison, 
 and when all concur in one effect, the greatest 
 distinctions are produced. 
 
 Food being the most effective and essential 
 cause of variety in the value of animals, this has 
 
 B 3 
 
6 GENERAL VIEW OF THE SUBJECT. 
 
 commanded more attention than the operation 
 of climate and lodging in respect to animals : 
 and climate and lodging being the more imme- 
 diate, effective, and obvious cause of the variety 
 and value of vegetables, these have commanded 
 more attention than food in respect to vegetables. 
 But to avail ourselves of the full advantage al- 
 lowed by nature, food, climate, and lodging, 
 both as they affect the one and the other, must 
 be clearly understood and equally attended to. 
 \^ The general progress of nature is uniform; 
 and in the continuation of her works, as if to 
 avoid the disorderly effect of an extreme indulg- 
 ence, or the capricious negligence of individuals, 
 the sexes were created, and it was ordained that 
 a junction of the two should be necessary for the 
 production of one individual ; and that in their 
 offspring, the habits and propensities of both male 
 and female should be blended. 
 
 And further to protect her creatures from ca- 
 sual injury arising from a change of food, lodging, 
 and climate, the habits of both animals and ve- 
 getables are made subservient to such changes : 
 thus, the continuation of a superabundance of 
 food produces an increase in size, and a defici- 
 ency of food a decrease ; a cold and a hot climate, 
 and a wet and a dry lodging, each produces a 
 coat or covering for the body, and a tempera- 
 
 20 
 
GENERAL VIEW OF THE SUBJECT. 7 
 
 ment of constitution best adapted to counteract 
 extremes: these things, therefore, form most 
 important objects of consideration. 
 
 Animals and vegetables administer to the wants 
 of mankind in various ways ; some by their flesh, 
 or the immediate substance of their bodies ; 
 others by their offspring and seed, or the food 
 provided by nature for their offspring ; others, 
 again, by their exterior covering, and others by 
 assisting man in his labour, and contributing to 
 his pleasures : therefore, in breeding and feeding 
 both animals and vegetables, due regard must be 
 paid to the peculiar object desired. And as na- 
 ture ever determines the end to the means, the 
 attention of the agriculturists must be directed 
 to the adapting their means to the end in view. 
 
 Nature is ever kind and liberal in providing 
 for the necessities of her creatures ; and being 
 always inclined to make an exuberant return in 
 her productions, for extra aid, she thus gives to 
 mankind an opportunity to avail themselves of 
 such propensities : by removing obstructions, and 
 favouring and protecting the general operations 
 of nature, and supplying the deficiency of any 
 needful support, they may increase their means 
 of subsistence and enjoyment. 
 
 But although mankind are thus blessed by an all- 
 bountiful Providence, their power is prescribed, 
 
 B 4 
 
8 GENERAL VIEW OF THE SUBJECT. 
 
 and they are not permitted to act in opposition to 
 the laws of nature with impunity; whenever, 
 therefore, they presume to interfere with the 
 operations of nature, with a view to produce any 
 beneficial or certain effect, they must pay all due 
 deference to her laws ; all attempts to produce 
 sudden and abrupt changes, and wide extremes, 
 must be avoided : by assisting nature certain ob- 
 jects may be obtained, but attempts to force or 
 oppose her, generally produce disorder, and 
 often destruction. 
 
 These preliminary observations naturally lead 
 to the three following grand divisions of the 
 subject : viz. 
 
 The breeding and raising of vegetables j 
 The breeding and rearing of animals ; 
 And, as connected with both these, The 
 cultivation of the earth, or the producing and 
 preparing food and lodging for both. 
 
 In this order I shall proceed to consider and 
 arrange my observations. 
 
9 
 
 ON BREEDING AND RAISING VEGETABLES. 
 
 THE nature of the sexual intercourse, in the 
 propagation of animals, may be considered as too 
 well understood to 4ieed a minute explanation ; 
 but of the necessity of the sexual intercourse, in 
 the propagation of vegetables, many are still ig- 
 norant. I may therefore, perhaps, be excused for 
 intruding some observations on this part of the 
 subject, and for giving extracts from prece- 
 ding authors. 
 
 It may be but of trifling importance, who was 
 the first that discovered, the existence of a differ- 
 ence in the sexes in vegetables ; but as Bradley, 
 in a work on the improvement of planting and 
 gardening, published in 1730, seems to have 
 been one of the first English authors who wrote 
 on the subject, and as his description is clear 
 and simple, I shall give it in his own language. 
 
 He says, " I hope to be excused, if in the 
 "explanation of this wonderful mystery of the 
 " generation of plants, I shall be found to intro- 
 " duce such kind of plants as are not to be found 
 "in forests, and to make some of my experi- 
 "ments in the orchard and kitchen-garden. 
 
10 ON BREEDING AND RAISING VEGETABLES. 
 
 " Moses tells us, in his account of the creation, 
 "that plants have their seeds within themselves ; 
 " that is, every plant contains in itself, male and 
 " female powers. The text he has given us, 
 " seemed to be explained by this discovery, and 
 " may lead us to consider, that plants wanting 
 " local motion, require therefore this union of 
 "sexes in themselves; by which means they 
 "may generate without the neighbourhood of 
 " other plants. But before I proceed to explain 
 " this new system, I think myself obliged to de- 
 " clare, that the first time this secret was com- 
 " municated to me, was several years ago, by a 
 " worthy member of the Royal Society, Robert 
 " Yates, Esq., who has had this notion for above 
 " thirty years, that plants had a mode of ge- 
 " nerating somewhat analogous to that of ani- 
 " mals. The light which I received from this 
 " gentleman was afterwards further explained by 
 " another learned member of that society, Mr. 
 "Samuel Moreland, who in the Philosophical 
 " Transactions, 1703, has given us to understand 
 " how the dust of the apices of male flowers is 
 " conveyed into the uterus, or vasculum semi- 
 " nale of a plant ; by which means the seeds 
 " therein contained are impregnated. I then 
 u made it my business to search after this truth, 
 " and have had the good fortune enough to bring 
 " it to demonstration by several experiments. 
 
ON BREEDING AND RAISING VEGETABLES. 11 
 
 " But to come to the point : the lily being a* 
 " flower more generally known than any other, 
 " and the generative parts being large and ex- 
 " posed, I shall from thence endeavour to explain 
 "the method which nature makes use of, to 
 " impregnate the seeds of that and every other 
 " plant ; and by which means the several species 
 "of vegetables have been continued to the 
 "world. 
 
 " The flower of the lily has six leaves or petals, 
 " which are set upon the summit of the foot-stalk, 
 " marked a in the figure ; they serve to guard 
 " the parts of generation from the injury of 
 "the weather, and as they are no other use, 
 " that I know of, so it is not necessary that I 
 
12 ON BUEEDING AND RAISING VEGETABLES. 
 
 " should place them in the figure, b is the 
 *' mouth of the pistilium, or passage, which leads 
 " to the uterus c, in which are these ovaries 
 " filled with little eggs, or the rudiments of seeds, 
 " such as we find in the ovaria of animals : but 
 " these eggs will decay and come to nothing, 
 " unless they are impregnated by the farina fe- 
 " cundans, or male seed of the same plant, or 
 " one of the same sort. 
 
 "From d to e is the stamen of the lily, 
 " through which the male seed of the plant is 
 "conveyed, to be perfected in the apex f; 
 " where by the sun's heat it ripens, and bursts 
 " forth in very minute particles like dust ; some 
 " particles of which powder falling upon the 
 " orifice b, is either conveyed from thence into 
 " the vesicle c, or by its magnetic virtue draws 
 " the nourishment with great force from the 
 " other parts of the plant into the embryos of 
 " the fruit, and makes them swell. 
 
 " Now that the farina fecundans, or male dust, 
 " has a magnetic virtue, is evident, for it is that 
 " only which bees gather and lodge in the cavi- 
 " ties of their hind legs to make their wax with ; 
 * and it is well known, that wax when it is warm 
 " will attract to it any light body." 
 
 Whatever may be thought of magnetic power, 
 the wise providence of nature is here wonder- 
 
ON BREEDING AND RAISING VEGETABLES. 13 
 
 fully displayed, by guarding in a different and 
 more certain manner against casual obstruction, 
 as well as the inability of a plant to bring toge- 
 ther the necessary parts formed for the propaga- 
 tion of its species. Every flower is furnished 
 with a receptacle, called the nectarium, wherein 
 is secreted, an odoriferous and very sweet liquid, 
 which attracts, and serves for the food of bees, 
 and other insects ; and these vessels are always 
 placed below the apices and the pistilium, so that 
 the insects in their endeavours to obtain their 
 nectar, must pass over, and between, the apices, 
 and also the pistilium ; and the farina or dust 
 sticking about them, is thus conveyed to the 
 mouth of the pistilium, and the process of 
 impregnation performed ; without this assist- 
 ance, there are some plants which could scarcely 
 ever be brought together, or impregnated : for 
 instance, the cucumber and the melon, and all 
 others of this tribe of plants, which have distinct 
 male and female blossoms, when growing in si- 
 tuations where the wind has no power to dis- 
 perse the farina. 
 
 As an elucidation of this, I may mention the 
 progress and result of the following experiment : 
 being desirous to obtain seed from a peculiar 
 head of broccoli, and well aware that the inter- 
 course of bees would occasion the seed to be 
 
14 ON BREEDING AND UAISING VEGETABLES. 
 
 different to the mother plant, I surrounded the 
 sides of the plant with a frame of gauze, suffi- 
 ciently open to admit a free change of air, and 
 placed a hand glass on the top, and the conse- 
 quence was, not a single seed was formed ; ob- 
 serving the failure, I removed the covering, and 
 gave free access to the bees, &c., when a few 
 remaining blossoms immediately fructified, and 
 produced full pods of seed. 
 
 Bradley proceeds, " But again, if the parti- 
 " cles of this powder should be required by na- 
 '< ture to pass into the ovaries of the plant, and 
 " even into the several eggs or seeds there 
 " contained, we may easily perceive, if we split 
 " the pistilium of a flower, that nature has pro- 
 " vided a sufficient passage for it into the 
 " uterus. 
 
 " In the first figure I have given a design of 
 " one stamen, with its apex, to prevent mistakes 
 " in my explanation ; but the flower of every lily 
 " has six of the same figure and use, which are 
 " placed round about the pistilium or female 
 " parts, so that it is almost impossible it should 
 " escape from receiving some of the male dust, 
 " or farina feeundans, falling upon it. 
 _\^ w In this and other flowers of the same nature, 
 " the pistilium is always so placed that the apices 
 " which surround it are equal in height with it, 
 
ON BREEDING AND RAISING VEGETABLES. 15 
 
 " or above it, so that their dust naturally falls 
 " upon it ; and when we observe it to be longer 
 " than the apices, we may then conjecture that 
 < the fruit has begun to form itself, and has no 
 " longer occasion of the male dust. And it is 
 " likewise observable, that as soon as the work / 
 " of generation is performed, the male parts, \ 
 ' together with the leaves or covering, fall of 
 " and the pipe leading to the uterus begins to 
 " shrink. We may further remark, that the top 
 " of the pistilium of every flower is either co- 
 '* vered .with a sort of velvet tunick, or emits a 
 " gummy liquor, the better to catch the dust of 
 " the apices. 
 
 " And now, as we find in the description I 
 " have given of the lily, that the uterus is within 
 " the flower, so, on the other hand, the uterus 
 " of the rose is without the flower, at the bottom 
 " of the petals or flower-leaves. And likewise 
 " in fruit-trees, the cherries, plums, and some 
 " others, have their utricles within their flowers ; 
 " and the gooseberry, currant, apples, and pears, 
 " on the outside or bottom of their flowers. 
 
 " But further, although nature has designed 
 " the dust of the apices to fecundate the female 
 " parts, contained in the flowers of plants, yet 
 ' ' we observe, that in some plants the male and 
 " female parts are remote from each other ; as, / 
 
16 ON BREEDING AND RAISING VEGETABLES. 
 
 " for example, the gourd, pompion, melon, cu- 
 " cumber, and all of that race, have blossoms 
 " distinctly male and female upon the same 
 " plant : the male blossoms may be distinguished 
 " from the others, in that they have not any 
 " pistil or rudiment of fruit about them, but 
 " have only a large thrum, covered with dust, 
 " in their middle ; the female blossom of these 
 " has a pistilium within the petals or flower- 
 " leaves, and the rudiment of their fruit always 
 " apparent at the bottom of the flower before 
 " it opens. 'And so in like manner all nut-bear- 
 " ing and mast-bearing trees have their catkins, 
 " or male blossoms, remote from the female 
 " parts. 
 
 " The oak, for example, which blossoms in 
 " May, has its male parts distant from tne 
 " acorns. We find little strings of farinaceous 
 " flowers in great abundance, remote from the 
 " rudiments of the acorns or fruit. 
 
 " When we view with a good microscope the 
 " male dust of one small plant, we find every 
 " particle of it to be of the same size and figure. 
 " But in some cases it is of two colours, as in 
 " the tulip, where it is yellow and blue. 
 
 " I shall proceed to demonstrate part of this 
 " system. I made my first experiment upon the 
 " tulip ; which I chose rather than any other 
 
 V 
 
ON BREEDING OR RAISING VEGETABLES. 17 
 
 " plant, because it seldom misses to produce 
 " seed. Several years ago I had the conveni- 
 " ency of a large garden, wherein there was a 
 " large bed of tulips ; in one part, containing 
 " above 4-00 roots ; in another part of it, very 
 " remote from the former, were twelve tulips in 
 " perfect health. At the first opening of the 
 " twelve, which I was very careful to observe, 
 " I cautiously took out of them all their apices, 
 " before the farina fecundans was ripe, or any 
 " ways appeared- These tulips, being thus cas- 
 " trated, bore no seed that summer; while, on 
 " the other hand, every one of the 400 plants 
 " which I had let alone produced seed. 
 
 " By this knowledge we may, perhaps, alter 
 " the property and taste of any fruit, by impreg- 
 " nating the one with the farina of another of 
 " the same class : as, for example, a codlin with 
 " a pearmain, which will occasion the codlin so 
 " impregnated to last a longer time than usual, 
 " and be of a sharper taste ; or if the winter 
 " fruits should be fecundated with the dust of 
 " the summer kinds, they will decay before their 
 " usual time. And it is from this accidental ~*\ ^ 
 " coupling of the farina one with the other, that 
 " in an orchard, where there is variety of apples, 
 " even the fruit gathered from the same tree 
 " differ in their flavour and times of ripening ; 
 
 c 
 

 
 18 ON BREEDING OR RAISING VEGETABLES. 
 
 " and, moreover, the seeds of those apples so 
 " generated being changed by that means from 
 " their natural qualities, will produce different 
 " kinds of fruits if they are sown. It is from 
 " the accidental coupling that proceeds the 
 " numberless varieties of fruit and flowers which 
 " are raised every day from seed." 
 
 The latter part of these observations, no doubt, 
 are correct; but in his supposition, that the 
 coupling of the farina changes the flavour or the 
 general qualities of the immediate fruit, this 
 author is mistaken, as it produces no such effect. 
 The change takes place in the seed alone, and, 
 therefore, can only be discoverable in the next 
 generation. By this accidental coupling, there 
 can be no doubt, but that variety in every species, 
 is principally produced ; and by taking advan- 
 tage of this, and directing, and partially divert- 
 ing, the usual course of nature, changes in the 
 habits, and general properties of vegetables, and 
 their fruits, may be produced, as well as in 
 animals.' By admixing the farina of the blossoms, 
 and planting the seeds, varieties of potatoes are 
 obtained; but no variety can be obtained by 
 planting the potatoes themselves, either by vary- 
 ing the soil or mode of culture. And the same 
 may be said of apples, and other fruits ; for let 
 trees be propagated in whatever numbers, by 
 
 \ 
 
ON BREEDING OR RAISING VEGETABLES. 19 
 
 engrafting or budding, and on whatever stocks, \ 
 or by whatever means, it will create no variety ( 
 in the fruit. 
 
 It thus appears, that mankind possess the 
 same influence over the sexual intercourse of 
 vegetables, as over that of animals ; and, conse- 
 quently, they have it as much in their power, to 
 raise and establish peculiar varieties in the one, 
 as in the other, and upon the same principles, 
 viz. that of selecting and pairing the males and 
 females. And if it be desired to exert this in- 
 fluence, the process may be easily conducted, 
 in the following manner : a. blossom being se- 
 lected for a female, which has in itself the male 
 and female organs, as soon as the bud is ad- 
 vanced to the state of being on the point to 
 open or blow, the petals or flower-leaves must 
 be opened, and the apices or anthers taken off; 
 the blossom may then be left a day or two, until 
 the petals have expanded themselves, and the 
 pistilium be advanced to a state fit for impreg- 
 nation; then, a blossom being selected for a 
 male, when in full bloom, it must be taken off 
 the parent plant, and its apices, or anthers, gently 
 rubbed over the point, or end, of the pistiiium of 
 the prepared female blossom, so that the farina, 
 or dust, may attach itself to it ; after this, the 
 female must be defended against the intrusion 
 
20 ON BREEDING OR RAISING VEGETABLES. 
 
 of bees, or such like insects, or placed out of the 
 danger of being otherwise promiscuously impreg- 
 nated. It is by a close attention to these laws 
 of nature, that so many valuable varieties of 
 pulse, grain, fruit, roots, and esculent vegeta- 
 bles, have of late been raised and obtained. 
 It must also be observed, that by frequently 
 propagating from seeds, carefully selected from 
 those plants, which possess the most desirable 
 qualities, even though there be no intended 
 crossing or mixing of farina to produce varie- 
 ty, the most valuable habits of any species, 
 may be improved and increased 5 and particu- 
 larly by their being naturalised, and enabled to 
 adapt themselves to flourish, in any peculiar soil 
 or climate. 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 ALTHOUGH the difference in the sexes, appears 
 to be more strongly marked in animals, than in 
 vegetables ; the laws of nature, as they regard 
 the result of their connection, are much the same 
 in both. 
 
 On the subject of breeding, Sir John Sinclair 
 says, " The art of improved breeding consists in 
 " making a careful selection of males and fe- 
 " males, for the purpose of breeding stock 
 " with fewer defects, and with greater perfec- 
 " tions, than their parents, in which their mu- 
 " tual properties shall be continued, and their 
 " mutual faults corrected. 
 
 " The objects of improved breeding, therefore 
 " are to obviate defects, and to acquire and per- 
 " petuate desirable properties j hence, when a 
 " race of animals have possessed in a great de- 
 " gree, through several generations, the proper- 
 " ties which it is our object to obtain, their 
 " progeny are said to be well bred, and their 
 " stock may be relied on." 
 
 " It was upon this principle of selectiorfthat 
 " Bakewell formed his celebrated stock of sheep, 
 
 c 3 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 " having spared no pains or expense in obtain- 
 " ing the choicest individuals, from all the best 
 " kinds of long or combing woolled sheep, 
 " wherever they were met with : and it cannot 
 " be doubted, that any breed may be improved in 
 " the same manner ; namely, that of putting the 
 " best males to the finest females. After a su- 
 " perior breed, however, has been thus obtained, 
 * it is a point that has been much disputed, 
 " whether it is proper to raise stock ; 1st, from 
 " the same family ; or, 2d, from the same 
 " race, but of different families ; or, 3d, from 
 " races entirely different. 5 * 
 
 This explanation of Sir John Sinclair, without 
 doubt, is clear enough ; but as he found the 
 subject much disputed, so he seems to have left 
 it, at any rate, but resting on very indetermi- 
 nate grounds ; for although he gives an ample 
 detail of the observations, and practical results, 
 of many of the most eminent men, on both sides 
 the question, his own conclusions are by no 
 means demonstrated, but calculated to confuse 
 and mislead ; for he further says, " On breeding 
 " from the same family this method is called, 
 " breeding in and in, or putting animals of the 
 " nearest relationship together : though this 
 " plan was for some time in fashion, under the 
 " sanction of BakewelPs authority, yet experi- 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 23 
 
 " ence has now proved, that it cannot be sue- 
 " cessfully persevered in." 
 
 This conclusion, in a general sense, cannot be 
 admitted, but we may, indeed, admit, that there 
 are bounds, beyond which we cannot force na- 
 ture, for having reached the point of perfec- 
 tion, there we must stop ; we cannot proceed 
 farther. 
 
 Sir John should also have stated, what appears 
 to have been the fact, that Bakewell, not only se- 
 lected the finest males and females, but he spared 
 neither pains nor expense, in furnishing and adapt- 
 ing such climate, lodging^ and food, as appeared 
 most conducive to the forwarding his object; 
 and then, it might have been remarked, that the 
 pains and expense thus incurred by Bakewell, 
 to obtain his object, was so great, that the no- 
 velty alone of his produce, could command an 
 adequate return ; and this, perhaps, may be a 
 sufficient reason, why his plans could not be 
 considered as eligible to be generally followed, 
 but it does not furnish just grounds for con- 
 demning the principle, of breeding in and in, 
 altogether. 
 
 After a perfect stock has been obtained* how 
 is it to be continued ? This seems to be the grand 
 question, and it only can be answered on the 
 principles before explained, viz. by duly attend- 
 
&fc ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 ing to their qualities and habits, when selecting 
 the breeders ; and again, to the means, by which 
 those qualities and habits are sustained. If great 
 size be the valuable quality, and the utmost 
 nature will admit ofj has been produced by an 
 artificial climate and lodging, and a selection of 
 food, it must be obvious, that with the same 
 climate, lodging, and food, the same stock may 
 be kept up, by breeding in and in \ but with a 
 less congenial climate, lodging, and food, the 
 progeny of such animals, must decline, and be- 
 come less in size ; and at the same time, it 
 might be * observed, that under those circum- 
 stances, no crossing can keep up the size and pro- 
 pensities. And again, if animals or vegetables, of 
 whatever size, bred in a certain climate, and with 
 certain lodging and food, can be furnished with 
 a lodging, climate, and food, more congenial and 
 nutritive, they may be increased and improved, 
 
 Sir John proceeds, " It may, indeed, prove 
 " beneficial, if not carried too far, in fixing any 
 " variety that may be thought valuable, but on 
 " the whole it is only in appearance. Under 
 " this system, the young animal comes into the 
 " world on comparatively a very small scale ; by 
 " keeping it fat from the first moments of its ex- 
 *' istence, it is made to attain a greater size than 
 
 16 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 25 
 
 " nature intended ; and its weight, in conse- 
 " quence, will be very great in proportion to the 
 " size of its bones. Thus a generation of ani- N 
 " mals of an extraordinary form, and saleable at 
 " enormous prices, may be obtained, but^that 
 44 doesjiotjgrgvejthatjthe practice is eligible^ if ^ 
 " lp n JLE?ffied in ; on the contrary, if the system \ 
 " be followed up, the stock get tender and deli- 
 " cate ; they become bad breeders, and though 
 " they retain their shape and beauty, they will 
 " decrease in vigour and activity, will become 
 " lean and dwarfish, and ultimately incapable of \ 
 " continuing the race/' *"?. 
 
 If a striking instance, not only of the ab- 
 sence of physiological principles, in the appli- 
 cation of practical observation, but of the sub- 
 stitution of speculative opinion; was necessary, 
 to prove a want of scientific arrangement, in Sir 
 John Sinclair, surely this must be sufficient ; 
 and if such arguments as the following, against 
 the attempt to produce a certain effect, are per- 
 mitted to influence opinion, and such causes be 
 assigned, as these, " it is thus made to attain a 
 " greater size than nature intended" agriculture 
 might, indeed, continue to be mere speculation 
 and uncertainty. 
 
 But even were such observations, construed 
 in the most favourable manner, they apply par- 
 
26 ON BREEDING AND HEARING ANIMALS* 
 
 tially only, as they are descriptive of the effect of 
 injudicious selection, and of artificial feeding, and 
 do not prove the cause of defection, to be in the 
 general principle, of breeding in and in. 
 
 It appears, that Bakewell well knew how far 
 he could lead nature ;. and so far from his results 
 proving the insufficiency, of breeding in and in 
 to produce perfection, it completely establishes 
 the fact, that such an object cannot be obtained, 
 with equal facility, by any other means. 
 
 It 'must be admitted, that more valuable 
 animals in themselves, never were produced, 
 than those bred by Bakewell ; but the old 
 maxim no doubt is good, " You may purchase 
 " gold too dear." However, as before observed, 
 Bakewell had an object in view, and to ob- 
 tain this, every advantage of artificial climate, 
 food, and lodging, were resorted to, regardless 
 of expense; and so long as he could furnish 
 exuberance in food, climate, and lodging, he 
 found an exuberance in the flesh and size of his 
 animals returned ; but when his means of 
 increase were exhausted, nature made a stand 
 she never went "farther than she intended" 
 I once heard of a farmer, who, ambitious to 
 excel, purchased a bull from Bakewell, or some 
 such fancy breeder, and after having kept him 
 for some time, the beast lost flesh, and became 
 
ON REARING AND BREEDING ANIMALS. ^7 
 
 weak and languid ; the farmer on meeting 
 with his former feeder, complained that the ani- 
 mal was fast declining, although he had plenty 
 of grass, hay, &c. the feeder told the farmer, 
 that grass and hay were not sufficient ; for besides 
 these, he had been fed on grain, and had also 
 been indulged with a pail of milk every day, 
 from the time of quitting his mother. This suf- 
 ficiently shows the folly of carrying things to 
 such extremes for general purposes ; but it does 
 not prove Bakewell, to have been erroneous in 
 his judgment, nor doe&it detract from the prin- 
 ciple of breeding in and in. 
 
 It is the general practice of sheep farmers to 
 purchase their rams from professed breeders, at 
 enormous prices, and these, which are bred 
 under peculiar indulgences, are always kept 
 away from the flock, with an extra allowance of 
 the best food, such as grain, pulse, &c., and 
 frequently, also, are allowed the shelter of a 
 house ; the consequence is, that their stocks are 
 always lean and long, and large in their bones, 
 and unequal to sustain the hardships of the 
 natural climate, lodging, and food, with health 
 and vigour; and hence it is obvious, that the 
 .practice of crossing is not only attended with 
 much useless expence, but that it obstructs what 
 ought to be the object of every rational farmer 
 
28 ON BREEDING AND HEARING ANIMALS. 
 
 to obtain, viz., the possession of a stock, in every 
 respect adapted to the nature, and localities, of 
 his situation and circumstances. 
 
 Sir John Sinclair also says, " Sir John Sea- 
 " bright tried many experiments, by breeding in 
 "and in, with dogs, fowls, and pigeons, and 
 " found the breeds uniformly 4egenerate." But 
 it maybe remarked, that pigeons, dogs, and fowls, 
 
 Pfrom their long domestication, are already as much 
 removed from a state of nature, as nature will 
 admit of ; and being bred and fed more to please 
 the fancy than for any defined object, it frequently 
 happens that the most desired qualities are the 
 
 i effect of disease or distortion ; and, therefore, on 
 1 the principles laid down, it might be expected, 
 
 -^>. that weak, diseased, or defective males and fe- 
 males being selected and paired, would produce 
 those that are still more so. 
 
 Sir John Sinclair again says, " A gentleman 
 " who tried the experiment with pigs, brought 
 " them at last into such a state, that the female 
 " gave over breeding almost entirely, and when 
 " they did breed, their produce was so small 
 " and delicate, that they died as soon as they 
 " were born." Here also an effect is mistaken 
 for a cause ; these failures evidently arose from 
 wigin^aJLjiefect, and a peculiar selection in pair- 
 ing having been carried to an extreme, and 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 29 
 
 not solely on the principle of breeding in and 
 in ; no doubt, in the pursuit of this principle, 
 there are, as in every process, two extremes and 
 a medium. 
 
 As for dogs, I knew a gentleman, who by-\ 
 crossing had lost the valuable qualities of his ( 
 greyhounds, which determined him to try back, ) 
 by breeding from the nearest blood, and he suc- 
 ceeded, and recovered his lost excellence. And 
 Samuel Emley, Esq. of Salisbury, assured me, 
 he bred in and in, with the same family, both / 
 pointers and spaniels, for thirty years, and never } 
 found them degenerate. 
 
 No opinion is more common, than that game- 
 cocks will degenerate, when bred in and in ; but 
 having asked different breeders, in what points 
 they have been found to degenerate, I was an- 
 swered by one, that those so bred, would stand 
 up till killed, but that they had no spirit or ac- 
 tivity ; whilst the other asserted, that they were 
 all activity, spirit, and dash, at the onset, but 
 gave in after a blow or two. I have also re- 
 peatedly heard the same inconsistent objections , 
 made to breeding in and in with greyhounds ; 
 one party asserting, that those so bred, have: 
 great speed, but no bottom, whilst another states, 
 that they have no activity or speed, but will run . 
 till death. 
 
30 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 There can be no doubt, but that all these 
 failures may occur, when breeding in and in, 
 but they are clearly the effect of improper se- 
 lection, and establish no grounds of objection, 
 that will not as justly attach to the principle of 
 cross breeding. 
 
 In breeding animals for fattening, it is the 
 usual practice to select those for breeders, that 
 discover the greatest propensity to fatten or 
 grow fleshy, and such animals are generally 
 uncertain and bad breeders, and always bad 
 nurses ; and this rests on the principle I have 
 stated. The female being selected, as one in 
 whom the exuberance of nature is in her flesh, 
 Bnd whose food is appropriated entirely to the 
 increase of this, her powers of conception are 
 obstructed, and her young, neither during her 
 pregnancy, nor after their birth, can be fur- 
 nished by her with the nourishment necessary 
 to support them ; and sterility in the female, 
 and disorder and want of size and strength in 
 her progeny, must be the result. But after their 
 birth, the wants of nature in food and tempe- 
 rature, may be artificially supplied to the young, 
 and they may thus be reared, with all the appa- 
 rent qualities of their progenitors. 
 I obtained a sow pig, of a breed peculiar for their 
 propensity to fatten, from Mr. Hodgson. This 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 31 
 
 creature kept in high condition, even when fed 
 on grass alone, or simple wash and grains ; but 
 she never produced more than seven young 
 ones at a farrow, and two or three of those 
 were generally starved to death for want of her 
 producing milk, all her food being appropriated 
 to the increase of her own flesh, instead of fur- 
 nishing sustenance for her young ones ; and 
 whatever boar was put to her, made no differ- 
 ence in this respect, but I never obtained any 
 young ones, that possessed in an equal degree 
 her own propensities and shape, except when 
 put to her own son. I also obtained another 
 sow, of a very different breed, but of equally 
 strong propensities to fatten, and valuable pro- 
 portions, and although this animal was regularly 
 in season for more than twelve months, and put 
 to different boars, she never would breed. Such 
 a sort of pigs would certainly not answer to 
 keep as breeders of stock for a market, but to 
 purchase for fattening, they were worth 25 per 
 cent, more than any others I ever possessed. 
 Such peculiarities were, no doubt, produced by 
 breeding in and in, and could not have been 
 by any other means, but it was also more imme- 
 diately the effect of selection. Animals possess- 
 ing the opposite propensities, that of breeding 
 great numbers, with large bone, and such as 
 
32 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 are also with difficulty furnished with flesh, 
 may of course be produced, by observing the 
 same principles. 
 
 Sir John Sinclair likewise says, " Mr. Knight's 
 " experiments with plants have fully convinced 
 " him, that in the vegetable as well as the ani- 
 " mal kingdom, the offspring of a male and 
 " female, not related, will possess more strength 
 " and vigour than when they are of the same 
 " family, which proves how unprofitable such 
 " connections are." 
 
 Peculiar cases may have occurred, partially 
 to sustain such remarks, but these cannot justify 
 such a general conclusion. The terms " more 
 strength and vigour," can only be understood 
 as comparative. If a male from a plant of vi- 
 habits and full health, be coupled with 
 
 ^*^^N,^., n JLiii"^- 10 **^??^**^^* 1 ^ 
 
 . habits and bad health; is it 
 
 be expected that the offspring will be more 
 vigorous and healthy than the male parent ? 
 
 rely not ; it would be as contrary to nature 
 * as to reason: it might be more so than the 
 female, but this does not justify such a general 
 conclusion. 
 
 And further, Sir John says, " A change of 
 " seed is in general advantageous, in regard 
 " both to animals and vegetables ; hence many 
 " farmers are induced, not only to change tho 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 33 
 
 66 seed of the kind of grain they cultivate, butA 
 " to procure males from the flocks and herds 
 " of those who have the same, or similar withS 
 " their own. It has been remarked that those 
 " farmers have in general the worst flocks, who 
 " bred from rams produced on their own farms, 
 " and that an interchange of males is mutually 
 " beneficial." 
 
 These observations, like many others of Sir 
 John- Sinclair, are calculated more to mislead, 
 than_Jto inform, the ignorant agriculturist, for 
 instead of grounding his judgment and prac- 
 tice, on the established principles of science, he 
 is here recommended to rely on _ blind j^ance, 
 or the casual observation and imitation of others. 
 
 By crossing different varieties of vegetables, 
 
 no doubt, other varieties may be obtained, and, A" 
 perhaps, such as possess more valuable qualities / 
 than the parent plants ; but with vegetables as ( 
 with animals, food and climate, possess the / 
 greatest influence, in varying their qualities; thus\ 
 the seeds of plants, transplanted from a sterile 
 soil and uncongenial climate, to a luxuriant soil( 
 and congenial climate, will increase in the luxu- \ 
 riance of their produce, with every generation, / 
 until they have reached the bounds prescribed j 
 by nature, and vice versa. 
 
 Sir Humphry Davy very justly observes, 
 D 
 
34 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 " As plants are capable of amelioration, by pe- 
 " culiar methods of cultivation, and of having 
 " the natural term of their duration extended, 
 " so in conformity to the general law of change 
 " they are rendered unhealthy, by being ex- 
 " posed to peculiar unfavourable circumstances, 
 " and liable to premature old age and decay. 
 
 " The plants of warm climates transported 
 " into cold ones, or of cold ones transported 
 " into warm ones, if not absolutely destroyed 
 " by the change of situation, are uniformly ren- 
 " dered unhealthy," 
 
 A difference in opinion may always be ex- 
 pected to exist, as to the form and colour that 
 constitutes the beauty of animals, as well -as ve- 
 getables, but it cannot be denied that the grand 
 object of agriculture, should be a profitable pro- 
 duce. The mode of attaining this object, no 
 doubt, will be determined, in a great measure, 
 by peculiarity of situation and circumstances; 
 but taking it for granted that every agriculturist 
 must be desirous of keeping up the good qua- 
 lities, if not of improving his stock, the only 
 questions that can arise, are, What is an im- 
 provement? and, What will produce profit ? And 
 let this be determined as it may, perfection can 
 only be obtained by a selection of breeders. 
 
 If a greater or less size be required, stronger 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 35 
 
 propensities, or greater and more perfect health 
 and vigour, the object must be obtained by se- 
 lecting and pairing those males and females 
 which possess in the greatest degree the requisite 
 qualities, whether crossing be resorted to, or 
 breeding in and in. 
 
 When left to nature it is always determined 
 one way ; those which are rendered the weakest, 
 from whatever cause, are driven off) or down, by 
 the strongest and most vigorous : and as all have 
 to contend with the same climate, lodging, and 
 food, those possessing the best habits must al- 
 ways prevail, and consequently the breed must 
 be kept up to its greatest perfection. And that 
 an adherence to those principles which are the 
 most congenial to the laws of nature is the most 
 profitable, is clearly established by practical de- 
 monstration. 
 
 It is well known, that there. are many farms, 
 and many large districts that never do fatten 
 their stock, and indeed are considered and 
 found inadequate to it ; and what other cause 
 can be assigned for this, but that the stock are 
 bred by continual crossing with males reared 
 under advantages of superior lodging, food, and 
 climate, to what such farms and districts natu- 
 rally produce ? As Sir John Sinclair observes, ) 
 animals bred from the same family, and selected S 
 
 D 2. 
 
36 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 for their peculiar propensities to fatten, have a 
 large proportion of flesh, and but little bone ; 
 so, on the contrary, animals bred from meagre 
 fernales, living in a harsh climate, and with a 
 scanty supply of food, by crossing with males 
 of the largest size, produced by superior food, 
 and in a climate more congenial, have a large 
 proportion of bone, and but little flesh, and pos- 
 sess withal a more delicate and precarious state 
 of health. Any land whatever, that will furnish 
 food enough to maintain two animals in a state for 
 breeding, and with a climate and lodging requi- 
 site to sustain health and vigour, w r ill be found 
 equal to the fattening an animal that had been 
 naturalised to it by breeding in and in for several 
 generations. Every farm may be considered as 
 having its peculiar advantages and disadvantages, 
 compared with others, and a profit can only 
 arise from a skilful observance and management 
 of these. 
 
 There does not exist a more mistaken notion, 
 than that the stock of one farm may be kept equal 
 to every other, by crossing and changing the ani- 
 mals and seeds only. It has been well observed, 
 that " Nature provides every creature with a 
 " shelter from the storm." If a male and female 
 of any species of animal or plant be bred under 
 circumstances of a congenial climate, and a libe- 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 3? 
 
 ral supply of food, and afterwards placed in a ^ 
 situation where the climate is harsh, and the / 
 supply of food scanty, they must of necessity de- 
 cline in flesh, and in health and vigour : but 
 their young, bred under those circumstances of 
 
 privation will ^cauire habits, and be reduced 
 
 7> %A&t "~<r ?$*** ^^^ju*,/afc^*w. . / 
 
 > At "~<r *** ju*,^*. . 
 
 to a size, m&& conformable f and these again 
 
 breeding in and in, the habits of their progeny 
 will still become better adapted, until, by de- 
 grees, they will become perfectly inured and na- 
 turalised, and capable of making the utmost 
 return the farm is equal to, and at the least \ 
 expense. But if j on the other hand, the breeder 
 chooses to contend with, and oppose, nature ; 
 and instead of submitting to her laws, he still 
 persists in attempting to keep up the size, by a 
 fresh supply of males and females from the ori- 
 ginal quarter, he inevitably must be subjected 
 to the consequences of a want of health and vi- 
 gour, and incur great hazard, and extra expense. 
 That the above principles equally govern the 
 vegetable, as well as the animal world, has 
 been demonstrated by Sir Joseph^Banks, who 
 says, that jby repeatedly raising plants from the 
 seeds g0iwji, on .the ..sgot, he has so naturalised 
 tcTthis climate, vegetables that were natives of 
 a warm climate, and which on their first intro- 
 duction into this country, could only be kept 
 
 D 3 
 
38 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 f alive in conservatories, that they are now en- 
 \ abled to flourish in the open air without artificial 
 / protection. And in corroboration of those con- 
 clusions, I annex the following extracts: that 
 of Mr. Mason, from Sir John Sinclair's Code 
 of Agriculture, and Mr. Robinson's, from the 
 Farmer's Journal, of April 15th, 1816. 
 
 Answers by C. Mason, Esq. ofChilton, Durham, 
 to the question, whether the system of " Breed- 
 ing in and in" is advisable. 
 
 To answer the question on the propriety or 
 / impropriety of adopting the system called Breed- 
 \ ing in and in, it seems only necessary to recur 
 to the acknowledged principles of breeding in 
 general. It is admitted that all breeding pro- 
 ceeds on the presumption, that the tendency of 
 / any individual animal is to transmit to its off- 
 \ spring, the form, constitution, and. qualities 
 which it possesses ; and as two animals are con- 
 cerned in the production of one offspring, that 
 one .is expected to inherit a form and constitution 
 compounded of the joint qualities of its pa- 
 I rents. Thus it is found in numerous breeds of 
 \ animals, as in deer, in the west Highland cattle, 
 /'in the north Devon, and in the wild cattle of 
 Chillingham Park, the offspring for an indefinite 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 39 
 
 number of generations, have borne the same ge- 
 neral characters. These are examples, where 
 great numbers have contributed to the formation 
 of the several breeds, and while the general cha- 
 racter is found invariable, it is not observed to 
 be accompanied by any general deterioration, in 
 any essential quality: where any deterioration 
 therefore, is observed, it is most probably ascriba- 
 ble to one of two causes. 
 
 1st. From some peculiarity of circumstances, 
 few animals only may be concerned in the pro- 
 duction of the breed, and then, any individual 
 defect must not only be transmitted uncorrected, 
 but will necessarily increase in the progeny ; a 
 tendency to that defect being inherited by both 
 parents, and botri being immediately descended 
 from its original propagator. This defect may 
 be in size, from inclination to feed at an early 
 age, to feed fat with a comparative small con- 
 sumption of vegetable food, to lay that fat on 
 valuable points, or in constitutional health, and 
 according to the nature of the original defect, the 
 breed will become bad graziers, or incapable of 
 producing any but an unhealthy offspring. 
 
 2dly. The same effects may follow in breeds 
 formed by selection. The selector may have be- 
 gun with an individual having, some radical de- 
 fect in form, constitution, or quality: and if he 
 
 D 4 
 
40 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 want judgment or opportunity to correct such 
 defect, by employing other cattle of the same 
 breed, free from such, his cattle will degenerate, 
 as before explained. In the case of selection 
 from a small number, it is also to be observed, 
 that the selector too often chooses the weakest 
 male, because such appears of the most delicate 
 form, and nearest approaching to female sym- 
 metry ; and if this be continued for a few gene- 
 rations, it may be easily be supposed that such 
 a breed will dwindle, compared to one left to 
 the process of nature, in which the strongest 
 males driving off the weakest, are exclusively 
 employed for the propagation of the kind. 
 
 From these observations, strengthened as they 
 may be by the long established practice among 
 breeders of race-horses, &c., the result appears 
 to be, that any deterioration from breeding in 
 and in, is not a necessary consequence, but a fault 
 in the judgment of the foeeder* 
 
 A Letter by Mr. Joseph Robinson, published in 
 the Farmer's Journal, April \5th, 1816, in 
 answer to " A Norfolk Breeder's Queries "- 
 
 QIC. 1. How were the Northamptonshire 
 sheep treated the first summer after going to 
 fold? 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 41 
 
 Am. Picked the stubbles until they went to 
 turnips, on which they were wintered, and at 
 spring were removed to old grass land, and 
 never eat clover or artificial grasses. When 
 brought to-Whitsun fair, (May 17th,) such was 
 the glut of mutton that a price was not offered 
 for them, and three pound ten shillings each 
 would have purchased them. Not being sold, 
 they were turned back upon a piece of old turf, 
 where they remained all summer, without pro- 
 tection from sun and flies, and gained thirty- 
 five shillings each for five months' grazing. Had 
 they been sold and slaughtered at the end of two 
 years for three pounds ten shillings each, after 
 being hard worked the first summer, their merit 
 and great profit would not have been known, 
 which undoubtedly is the case with thousands of 
 the best animals in the nation. At the same 
 Whitsun fair, there was a lot of the great Leices- 
 ters, six in number, brought forward by a tup 
 man, who occupies a farm under Lord Fitzwil- 
 liam, which will feed any animal that possesses 
 any feeding nature ; and he has a father-in-law 
 who has two of the best turnip farms in the 
 county at command to winter sheep upon, and 
 corn troughs generally before them. Those six 
 Leicesters, after feeding upon the cream of two 
 or three farms, were brought forward to beat 
 
42 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 the hard- worked Northampton, which had been 
 bred twenty -jive years, sire and dam without a 
 cross, in the same county, in the same parish, and 
 bred and fed upon one farm only. 
 
 From the great indulgence of the Leicesters, 
 they might at that time have been ten shillings 
 per head more value; but the - Northamptons 
 were supposed to have cut ten shillings worth 
 more wool at two clips than they had, which was 
 an equivalent. The Leicesters being turned 
 back likewise, upon the farm of Lord Fitzwilliam, 
 and kept through the summer, were expected to 
 come again at St. Luke's fair, and to go to the 
 cattle show, in Sadler's yard, at Christmas. Thus, 
 while the Northampton s were paying thirty-five 
 shillings per head for five months' keeping, the 
 Leicester's made a retrograde motion ; the dry 
 summer, sun, and flies, did not suit them, they 
 went away like an owl in the desert, and their 
 price and weight kept secret. 
 
 I do not see any good purpose answered by 
 those honoured characters, who are ornaments to 
 our nation, bestowing their money to encourage 
 the bringing forward the best trained and finished 
 animals, effected by gathering the cream off the 
 best farms in different counties. Not one farm 
 or one county produces them. I cannot see how, 
 or by what means, the most profit may be made 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 43 
 
 of an acre of poor or middling land, which com- 
 poses the great majority of the soil of this king- 
 dom. If rent was paid by the head of stock, 
 instead of the acre, it might perhaps answer the 
 tenants purpose to bestow the indulgence upon 
 a few animals; but since rent is paid by the 
 acre, the question with the occupier is, how can 
 we make the most profit of an acre of land ? 
 
 Suppose soils were classed into three or four 
 different classes ; for instance, say land under 
 twenty shillings per acre, land above twenty and 
 under forty shillings, above forty and under 
 sixty shillings per acre, and premiums offered to 
 persons who would bring animals forward mak- 
 ing most profit of an acre of grass, cleaning up 
 rough and smooth, would not that answer a bet- 
 ter purpose, as it would hold out encouragement 
 to different classes of men and soils ? There is 
 by far the greatest proportion of poor and mid- 
 dling land, and on that must depend the princi- 
 pal supply of the market. 
 
 An attempt to improve the breed of animals 
 for the shambles, by making choice of the largest 
 males, is as ancient as it is fruitless ; and is it 
 not strange to see it renewed in the nineteenth 
 century, by the professed followers of a Bake- 
 well ? They say the attempt is laudable, because 
 difficult to be obtained. Difficult to breed a 
 
44 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 large good one? A sufficient reason why I 
 should object to it. Shall we refuse the common 
 necessaries of life, bread and water, because 
 easy of access, and substitute in their room what 
 is hard to obtain ? Will that do for the great 
 national family, who are spending their strength 
 for a bare subsistence for themselves and fami- 
 lies ? They say it is easy to breed a little good 
 one ; then is it not wisdom to accept the offered 
 good? 
 
 " Not to know a treasure's worth 
 Till time has stolen away the slighted good, 
 Is cause of half the miseries we feel, 
 And makes the world the wilderness it is." 
 
 COWPER. 
 
 I cannot, for one moment, suppose that the 
 great or small size of an animal has any thing to 
 do with his goodness as a stock -getter. 
 
 " To find the medium, asks some share of wit, 
 And, therefore, is a mark fools never hit." 
 
 Again let me beg those luminaries to come to 
 the test of reason. They say we cannot combine 
 great wool and great mutton ; if we increase one, 
 we decrease the other. Then what are they 
 doing by enlarging the frame? Are they, by those 
 means, diminishing or increasing the difficulty ? 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 45 
 
 As every animal is supported through the me- 
 dium of the stomach, a wool-bearing animal has 
 two demands, to support wool and carcase ; 
 nor can either thrive further than nourishment is 
 afforded. Then how wrong to put large animals 
 upon a poor pasture, that produces but little 
 herbage, and that little, less nutritious ! 
 
 Again, when they say it is easy to get a little 
 good one, if they mean by a good one, one 
 which will produce a son better than his sire, 
 and a third better than a second, and a fourth 
 better still ; that is what I shall call a good one. 
 If such a one is easily produced, do not the 
 hungry, poor, oppressed tenantry, the great 
 national family, in the name of all that is good, 
 call upon them to do it ? Why trifle with the 
 sacred wants and comforts of man ? 
 
 Again, they say we cannot combine heavy 
 wool with a good carcase. I believe not with 
 long middles and high legs, or with whimsical 
 fanciful niceties. But to say they cannot be 
 combined upon any principle is wrong: expe- 
 rience has proved we can do it with sheep that 
 are calculated to live and thrive upon poor and 
 middling soils. 
 
 I am convinced it would be a valuable acqui- 
 sition, if males to get stock were all bred upon 
 poor and middling soils, and treated as common 
 
46 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 grazing stock ; then they would appear in their 
 true light. What does pampering do, but de- 
 ceive the unthinking ? And passing a bad stock- 
 getter, not only wrongs the person who uses 
 him, but injures the public, and ultimately falls 
 upon the poor. 
 
 The man who produces a pound of flesh, or 
 a bushel of bread corn, where it was not pro- 
 duced before, gives food to the hungry, and so 
 far promotes the works of God in his provi- 
 dence. 
 
 Qu. 2. Is thirty-one months the most profit- 
 able age to sell sheep, or to go to market at an 
 earlier period ? 
 
 Ans. The most proper time depends on cir- 
 cumstances ; if sheep are hard worked at an 
 early age, they require more time ; but if in- 
 dulged, will ripen sooner. 
 
 Qu. 3. What were they bred from, twenty- 
 five years before. 
 
 Ans. They were bred from a Dishley tup, 
 put to Northampton ewes, before the name of 
 New Leicester was known ; when Mr. Bake- 
 well was rising out of the solitary vale where he 
 could not meet his creditors, the vale in which 
 he learned, by repeated experiments, of tying up 
 different sorts of sheep, and weighing food to, 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 47 
 
 and refuse from them. By that slow and trouble- 
 some process, he found which were the best of 
 the different sorts he tried. When he had done 
 this, such was the wayward prejudice of breed- 
 ers in that day, they would not have them, and 
 it was with difficulty he could prevail on any 
 one to try them ; the prevailing opinion was, 
 too little, too little. Where they were tried, 
 wonders were v/rought; they made great im- 
 provement wherever they went, and no other 
 sheep would stand in competition with them. 
 Then his sheep were suited to poor land, a hard 
 common, the most so of any sheep. There are 
 people now living who heard Mr. Bakewell say, 
 that I, with my poor land, did him more credit 
 than any man in the three kingdoms. But the 
 great man mistook the effect for the cause ; he 
 knew what constituted a pleasing form, and what 
 was a good quality, but his capacious mind was 
 never led to consider what it was that gave the 
 animal strength of stamina ; if he had known it, 
 surely he would have communicated it to some 
 one, nor would he ever have departed from it. 
 He never thought how he procured it, or how 
 he lost it ; but when he had lost it, his sheep 
 were like Sampson when he had lost his hair 
 and became as another man. When he had lost 
 sterling worth, then he began to enquire after 
 
48 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 the trappings of fashion. Then the general ques- 
 tion was, What will be in fashion two years 
 hence? And some people yet living must re- 
 collect what became the fashion : some of the 
 worst animals that ever were introduced under 
 the palliating name of Bakewell, high blood. 
 They had heads like snakes, eyes like hares, and 
 not one feature of a natural sheep. Mr. Bake- 
 well was a great politician, and by forming a 
 society of nearly twenty learned men from dif- 
 ferent counties, no other sheep ever had such a 
 weight of interest twisted, entwined, and wreath- 
 ed in their support. Under these circumstances, 
 for a lot of sheep of any other sort to be brought 
 forward to any public exhibition, were like an 
 individual standing against a crowd ; and as they 
 had possession of most of the best land in the 
 kingdom, it must be something very superior to 
 them to make any sort of stand against them. 
 Be that as it may, Dame Truth is no gossip, if 
 she is spoken with, it must be at home, for she 
 will go to none, and without the old gentle- 
 woman there is no certainty in breeding. I will 
 appeal to any one -who has been a tup man for 
 forty years, whether he has not been frequently 
 disappointed, and sometimes received least when 
 he expected most, and vice versa ; which proves 
 that without that something, which a Bakewell 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 49 
 
 never knew, no mercenary project, no combina- 
 tion of interest, can go straight forward to im- 
 prove the breed of sheep. Improve, did I say ? 
 I query whether there has been any improve- 
 ment in the breed of sheep in Northamptonshire 
 these last twenty or thirty years, other than what 
 has arisen from inclosures which afford a shelter, 
 and the introduction of turnips and clover, and 
 the use of mercurial ointment. I am persuaded 
 that what are called the New Leicesters, are not 
 near so good as they were ; in fact, without that 
 something, going into this or that county, or to 
 this or that man, for a male, is like a person 
 afflicted with the rheumatism going to Bath for 
 relief, and not using the waters. Bakewell's 
 sheep, at one time, would not only improve all 
 others, but would endure equal hardships, and 
 make more profit of an acre of land than any 
 other sort; would bear the inclemency of seasons, 
 needed nothing to create desire and tempt appe- 
 tite. And as he knew his sheep needed no extra 
 indulgence, he would not let a person a tup, 
 unless he would engage not to give the offspring 
 corn. The professed followers of Bakewell have 
 no objection to their customers giving their sheep 
 corn, and every other indulgence, sparing no 
 expense. They know that fat upon an animal, N 
 like charity, covers a multitude of faults. It is 
 
 E 
 
,50 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 the prevailing fashion of some, now tacking 
 about, to produce large fat males ; and to what 
 purpose, but to make a better hand of their corn 
 than to take it to market : and knowledge, tak- 
 ing the advantage of ignorance, dupes the cre- 
 dulous out of their money. 
 
 Can the great quantity of fat laid upon an 
 animal, at such expense, produce a better sta- 
 mina in the offspring, or were ever the best 
 animals produced from the largest males? If 
 they were, Bakewell was wrong altogether. Can 
 it be right to call an animal from such an in- 
 dulgence and put him upon poor land to work, 
 whereby he is brought into a rapid decline, 
 when propagating his species ; and may not a 
 sudden transition of a male from a fat to a lean 
 state be injurious to the constitution, and is it 
 strange that they produce a declining stock ? 
 
 Various are the conjectures how or where 
 Bakewell procured his sheep ? He had them 
 from Lincolnshire, not from the rich marshes. 
 He there bought a score of ewes of a person 
 who could not be prevailed upon to sell a fa- 
 vorite tup, and agreed to give a guinea an ewe 
 to have them tupped by him before they came 
 home ; a great business-man, in Leicestershire, 
 saw them on the road coming home, and heard 
 something about the cost of tupping, and who 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 51 
 
 told Mr. Bakewell, at Loughborough market, 
 lie would not have them at the price they cost 
 the tupping. I think the original price was 
 four guineas a-piece, and when he was under 
 his misfortunes, his ewe lambs were valued at 
 no more than eight shillings each : the best 
 things he ever was in possession of, and from 
 which the tups that made hundreds sprang ; 
 these were called the Dishley blood, in distinc- 
 tion from that part of his flock which were 
 dashed with the Durham blood ; the former pos- 
 sessed short legs and thick carcases ; the latter 
 higher legs, longer and larger sheep with de- 
 fective fleeces; sometimes a fine large animal 
 was produced, but not being suited to the poor 
 soils, did not wear like the others. 
 
 Perhaps it would be thought arrogance in 
 any person to say he knows more of sheep 
 breeding than Bakewell did ; but surely one 
 may say some sheep are bred upon a principle 
 different from any other sort of sheep upon the 
 island. Whether they are better or worse, I will 
 leave time and experiment to prove, but am 
 persuaded that if ever that principle becomes 
 generally acted upon, the same quantity of herb- 
 age which now produces two pounds of flesh 
 will produce three pounds ; and then what an 
 increase of wealth to the nation, and what room 
 for an increase of population ! 
 
 "E 2 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 Although one sort of sheep cannot be right 
 for all soils, if we must have two sorts of wool, 
 one principle may be right to breed all sorts of 
 sheep upon, viz. that which will turn a given 
 quantity of herbage to the most advantage. 
 
 Notwithstanding all the quackery and mystery 
 generally practised, there can be but two ways of 
 improving animals, viz. to breed from stock of a 
 good stamina, and train them in a proper manner 
 when bred. Dame Nature cannot be led, but 
 may be followed and assisted by human art. 
 
 Had Bakewell fixed a criterion, by which the 
 public might ascertain what constituted a right 
 animal for breeding stock, surely after thirty 
 years' steady pursuit of the object, the best 
 sheep would be found in more hands than they 
 are at this time, and the tupmen in different 
 counties not for ever destined to a dependance 
 on the few tupmen in Leicestershire for support, 
 and the public mind would have been at rest. I 
 suppose the Dishley Society were formed for 
 something like that, and to keep the best blood 
 entire, that the public might know where to find 
 it, but they seem as much divided in opinion 
 as others; some say one thing is the best, and 
 some say another ; like Dr. Priestley when he 
 offered his services to make up a creed for 
 the Church of England, and had not made up 
 his own. 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. ,58 
 
 Qit. 4f. Are they in the habit of making such 
 prices ? 
 
 Ans. In the year 1812, Charles Tibbits, Esq. 
 having ninety cull ewes to sell, indulged a friend 
 with thirty of the best of them, and the remain- 
 ing sixty were sold by auction, and averaged 
 three pounds fifteen shillings each, when a no- 
 bleman in the neighbourhood sold one hundred, 
 which averaged about forty shillings each, and 
 a shear-hog was slaughtered, that weighed nearly 
 sixteen stone, to win a wager; it paid one shil- 
 ling and three-pence per week, for eighty-two 
 weeks' keeping. 
 
 In 1814, ten sheep were sold in a public fair 
 to a stranger, which paid one shilling and three- 
 pence per head per week, for one hundred and 
 four weeks' keeping ; fifty, sold in a lot, paid one 
 shilling and four-pence per week, for one hun- 
 dred and ten weeks' keeping, all grazed in a 
 common way, without the aid of the scuttle, 
 and have dissected a carcase, which produced 
 thirteen and a half ounces of meat to a bare 
 half ounce of bone. 
 
 The above sheep all produced from males, 
 bred upon a farm that was supposed incapable 
 of supporting a sheep through the year before 
 I bought it, I would always choose such a si- 
 tuation, from conviction that the best sort of 
 
 E 3 
 
54 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 animal might be bred upon, and are best suited 
 to, the worst soils, but not matured thereon. 
 
 Qu. 5. Are they bred by measure, height, 
 and length, or upon what system are they bred ? 
 
 Am. As to system, they are not philosophers 
 sufficient to know exactly how high the atmo- 
 spheric air will raise sheep to make them perfect ; 
 they know how many inches it will raise quick- 
 silver in a glass tube, but do not take that to 
 be a measure of perfection for sheep, so as to 
 render it necessary to take an exciseman's stick 
 when they want to engage a male. 
 
 Qu. 6. Any thing particular in the form of 
 the face, the length of the ear, &c. ? 
 
 Ans. This question reminds me of what a 
 nobleman's steward said some years ago ; he 
 went into a distant county to procure males, to 
 improve his master's flock at some future time. 
 Seeing some Northamptons pass the porter's 
 lodge, he asked where they came from; and when 
 he saw the person who bred them, he asked 
 him where he had the breed from. The steward 
 said, the breeders in a distant county told him 
 if he got such features, face, eyes, &c. he would 
 have every thing else accompanying it; but he said, 
 " I have the face, and you the every thing." 
 
 The above letter is written in a stile bordering 
 on the ludicrous, yet it is evidently much to the 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 purpose ; and although Mr. Robinson appears 
 more inclined to taunt than to praise Bakewell, 
 he furnishes practical demonstration of the cor- 
 rectness of Bakewell's principles. By Mr, Ro- 
 binson's own admission, Bakewell was in every 
 respect equal to his task ; he took up and pur- 
 sued most honourably the same principles which 
 Mr. Robinson upholds, until he found it would 
 not produce the grand object, riches. The 
 fact seems to be that Bakewell unfortunately 
 experienced the fate of many men of first-rate 
 abilities, viz. to have expended in the pursuit 
 of science, more than he gained ; and perhaps, 
 under the depression of heavy expense and 
 mortification, was induced to submit to the fas- 
 cination of fame, and to court fortune through 
 the medium of fancy or fashion. This line of 
 conduct, undoubtedly, gives Mr. Robinson the 
 advantage of accusing him of a want of true 
 patriotism, but it by no means supports the 
 charge of ignorance. A man of genius, who 
 can command the fashion, will feel no difficulty 
 in putting himself upon an equality with the 
 plodding man ; but the plodding man can never 
 place himself upon equal terms with the man 
 of genius, as a leader of fashion. Bakewell, in 
 the pursuit of perfection in the way of business, 
 became so thoroughly acquainted with the laws 
 of nature, as to be able to lead her to her 
 
5(3 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 utmost limits, and having succeeded in attract- 
 ing the attention of those that were able and 
 willing to pay for fancy, he committed but a 
 common fault in availing himself of such an 
 ample resource for retrieving his fortune. 
 
 Mr. Robinson's experience in every respect 
 sustains Bake well's principles of breeding, but 
 he has the merit of marking the true point 
 where the husbandman ought to stop, and he 
 justly describes what ought to be the object of 
 every man who seeks to make the most of his 
 land. The landlord often drives, and rides, a 
 horse high-bred ; but from this, it is not to be 
 concluded that the tenant ought to breed his 
 horses from the same stock. Strange as it may ap- 
 pear, it is well known, that fashion reigns as para- 
 mount among what are called, the simple plodding 
 farmers, in determining their choice of stock, as 
 among the weaker sex in their dress ; and the 
 farmer looks with as much envy on the esquire's 
 made-up ram, or bull, as his wife or daughter, does 
 at the lady's bonnet : and thus, although from 
 the nature of the farm, he cannot support in 
 health and vigour a sheep of one -fourth the 
 size of those which the esquire produces, or 
 purchases at great prices, and sustains by artifi- 
 cial means, he will do the best he can by buy- 
 ing his cast-off rams : and thus he produces a 
 long, shanky race of animals, with almost as 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 5? 
 
 much bone and hair as muscle and wool; 
 and what is still as strange, this fashion also ex- 
 tends to the grazier ; his agent at the fair looks 
 out for a coarse frame of bone, and persuades 
 him it will carry more fat ; and this practice is 
 become so general, that the butchers' stalls ex- 
 hibit nothing but large, coarse joints of mutton, 
 consisting of fat sinew and bone ; and small mut- 
 ton is so scarce, that the public are induced to pay 
 one penny per pound more for lamb, from the ge- 
 neral dislike and inconvenience of large mutton : 
 and thus throughout, ignorance and credulity 
 are fed by ignorance and vanity, until reason 
 itself is obliged to give way. Mr. Robinson's, 
 as well as Bakewell's principles, are incontrovert- 
 ible ; and by following the plans and maxims of 
 the former, no doubt the hills and valleys of 
 Wiltshire, Hampshire, Somersetshire, Dorset, 
 Sussex, &c., may be made to breed and fatten the 
 most delicious mutton ; whereas, at present, they 
 are wholly devoted to the rearing of animals 
 which are little better than coarse frames of skin 
 and bones, to be filled up with tallow and grease, 
 by being bloated with artificial food, or in the 
 gross unwholesome pastures of the lowlands and 
 marshes. 
 
 How much would gentlemen, possessing hill 
 farms in those counties, add to the pleasures 
 and comforts afforded by their country, as we* 
 
8 ON BREEDING AND HEARING ANIMALS. 
 
 as increase the public stock of provisions, if they 
 would devote their attention to the rearing of 
 sheep, and fattening them on the same farm, as 
 Mr. Robinson has done, than by continuing to 
 indulge in the vanity of excelling their neigh- 
 bours, in raising large, raw, bony carcases, to be 
 crammed by others in distant districts ! 
 
 In the production of wool, it is well known that 
 the climate, and natural produce and constitu- 
 tion of a farm, will of itself establish a medium 
 or proportion between the quantity and quality 
 of wool ; thus, it is found that the wool pro- 
 duced on one farm in Sussex, is of superior qua- 
 lity to that produced on another, even at a short 
 distance, although every means of changing 
 and crossing had been resorted to. Indeed, 
 what else could have established and naturalised 
 the beautiful breed of sheep called the South- 
 downs, and the valuable breed of Dorsets, or the 
 fine large long-wooled Leicesters, but that of the 
 breeders confining themselves to the assisting 
 nature, by selecting and pairing those animals 
 which were best adapted, in their local situation 
 and circumstances, to make the greatest return 
 in wool and mutton at the least expense ? 
 
 If the farmers of the South-downs had conti- 
 nually crossed with the Leicesters, could they 
 have produced sheep equal to Leicestershire? 
 or the Leicestershire farmers, by crossing with 
 
ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 59 
 
 South-downs, have produced sheep equal to the 
 South-downs ? Certainly not ; then why not ? 
 The nature of the food and the climate would 
 not admit of it ; and this mode of reasoning will 
 apply to every county, and almost to every farm. 
 
 It will cost very little more to breed a ram, 
 than an ewe ; and, therefore, the farmer who in a 
 general way pays more for a ram than the extra 
 price of breeding, added to the value of an ewe, 
 pays so much to proclaim his own inability and 
 comparative ignorance. 
 
 A striking instance of the indulgence of 
 farmers in fashion or fancy, even at a consider- 
 able sacrifice, is exhibited in the black faces and 
 legs of the South- down sheep. The great value of 
 those sheep over any other peculiar breed, consists 
 in the superior quality of their wool ; but by the 
 means adopted to preserve the black faces and 
 legs, black hairs are extended into, and some- 
 times dispersed through, the fleece ; and as the 
 locks containing black hairs, are unfit to make 
 white or light-coloured cloths, these must all be 
 thrown out, before the wool is in a fit state for 
 the manufacturer ; and the quantity and reduced 
 quality of this is such, as to reduce the value of 
 the whole fleece, %d* per pound. 
 
 The only object in preserving this striking 
 mark, that I have ever heard explained, is, that 
 such sheep are more hardy; but if by this is meant, 
 
60 ON BREEDING AND REARING ANIMALS. 
 
 that they are better enabled to endure cold wea- 
 ther, than they would if their faces and legs 
 were white, this is, on the clearest physical 
 principles, erroneous, and contrary to nature. 
 Thus we find in all the most northern climates, 
 that those animals which are of a dark colour, in 
 the warm seasons, change to white in the winter, 
 without which they could not endure the severe 
 cold they are doomed to encounter. Again, we 
 see the beneficence of our Great Creator has 
 given the native man of the burning climate of 
 Africa a black skin. Black absorbs and gives 
 out heat more rapidly than white ; as, in other 
 words, any body that is white, will retain the 
 heat which is engendered within it, much longer 
 than that which is black. Thus the white animal 
 in the frozen regions, is enabled to retain its 
 heat in a due degree, to preserve its health ; and 
 the black man, by a rapid emission 1 of heat, is 
 protected against those dreadful fevers, the fre- 
 quent consequence of accumulated heat, by a 
 retentive white skin. It is this principle which 
 determines the difference in temperature of 
 soils. A black soil will, in a given time, and 
 in the same exposure to the sun, acquire 
 eight or ten degrees of Farenheit more than a 
 white; and on an exclusion of the sun, the 
 black will soon be reduced many degrees below 
 the white. 6* 
 
61 
 
 ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE EARTH. 
 
 ALTHOUGH the earth appears capable of af- 
 fording a spontaneous produce in vegetables and 
 fruit, her powers of production or principles of 
 fertility, are found to be limited, and to exist in 
 different degrees, in different portions ; and it has 
 also been clearly proved, that where those powers 
 and principles abound in the greatest force, they 
 are sooner or later decreased and exhausted 
 by the growth of vegetables, according to the 
 constitution, situation, and circumstances of the 
 soil. It, therefore, is an object essential to the 
 art of agriculture, to ascertain the causes or 
 principles of fertility and sterility, as the only 
 means of acquiring the power to remedy defects, 
 remove opposing matter, make good deficiencies, 
 and, generally, to preserve and continue the land 
 in its most productive state. Every husband- 
 man or agriculturist may be supposed capable 
 of judging, what stock of animals his land is 
 peculiarly calculated to support, in its immediate 
 state ; and this, from a knowledge of the quantity 
 and kind of food such animals require, and the 
 influence of lodging and climate on them. But 
 a knowledge of the nature and application of 
 
62 ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE EARTH. 
 
 food to vegetables, and the influence of lodging 
 and climate on them, is not so generally under- 
 stood ; yet it is equally necessary it should be, 
 as it is this alone which can . enable a person to 
 follow cultivation successfully. 
 
 It has been demonstrated by direct experiment, 
 and is admitted by all philosophers, that earth 
 alone, in any combination of its primitive or sim- 
 ple principles, is incapable of maintaining plants 
 in health, or to enable them to attain maturity ; 
 that vegetables require food to sustain them ; 
 that their food consists of animal and vegetable 
 matter, reduced by decomposition, to a soluble 
 state ; and that such food can only be taken up 
 or consumed by plants, in a state of liquid, 
 through its roots ; but of what peculiar ele- 
 ments or principles such food is composed ofj 
 by what means prepared, or how the requisite 
 proportion of the liquifying medium is deter- 
 mined ; or by what peculiar powers such food 
 is taken up by vegetables, and digested, and 
 appropriated to their various increase and pro- 
 ductions, are as yet subjects of discussion and 
 uncertainty. 
 
 To establish these points, it has been found 
 necessary to discover and investigate the ele- 
 mentary principles of which vegetables and ani- 
 mals are composed ; and also to ascertain by 
 what organic powers the process of vegetation is 
 
 6* 
 
ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE EARTH. 63 
 
 carried on ; and by what means these elementary 
 principles or substances are collected, com- 
 bined, put into action, and appropriated or dis- 
 posed of; and likewise, the composition or con- 
 stitution, and properties of the earth, and the 
 manner in which it contributes to the formation 
 and sustenance of vegetables. To accomplish 
 these things, some of the most eminent chemical 
 philosophers of the age have given their attention, 
 and a very comprehensive little work on the sub- 
 ject has been published by Mr. Kirwan. 
 
 Sir Humphry Davy was also induced by the 
 Board of. Agriculture, to give to the public a 
 regular course of lectures on agricultural che- 
 mistry ; and as those two eminent professors 
 have in their works, given the subject a full at- 
 tention, and considered it in all its various parts, 
 and their authority being generally respected 
 and relied upon, I shall confine my observations 
 and reference, on this part of my subject, chiefly 
 to them. 
 
 Sir Humphry Davy justly observes, " It is 
 " scarcely possible to enter upon any investiga- 
 " tion in agriculture, without finding it con- 
 " nected more or less with doctrines or elucida- 
 " tions derived from chemistry. 
 
 " If land be unproductive, and a system of 
 " ameliorating it is to be attempted, the sure 
 "method of obtaining the object is by deter- 
 
ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE EARTH. 
 
 " mining the cause of its sterility, which must 
 " necessarily depend upon some def ect in the 
 " constitution of the soil, which may be easily 
 " discovered by chemical analysis ; some lands 
 ". of good apparent texture are yet sterile in a 
 " high degree, and common observation and 
 " common practice afford no means of ascer- 
 " taining the cause or removing the effect. 
 
 " The application of chemical tests in such 
 " cases is obvious, for the soil must contain some 
 " noxious principle, which may be easily dis- 
 * covered, and, probably, easily destroyed. Are 
 " any of the salts of iron present ? They may be 
 " decomposed by lime. Is there any excess of 
 " siliceous sand ? The system of improvement 
 " must depend on the application of clay a.nd 
 "calcareous matter. Is there a defect of cal ' 
 " careous matter ? The remedy is obvious. Is 
 " an excess of vegetable matter indicated ? It 
 " may be removed by liming, paring, and burn- 
 " ing. Is there a deficiency of vegetable matter ?. 
 " It is to be supplied by manure." 
 
 He also says, " The phenomena of vegetation 
 " must be considered as an important branch of 
 " the science of organized nature ; but though 
 "exalted above inorganic matter, vegetables 
 " are yet, in a great measure, dependant for 
 " their existence upon its laws. They receive 
 "their nourishment from the external elements; 
 
ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE EARTH. 65 
 
 " they assimilate it by means of peculiar organs, 
 " and it is by examining their physical and 
 " chemical constitution, and the substances and 
 " powers which act upon them ; and the modi- 
 " fications which they undergo, that the scientific 
 " principles of agricultural chemistry are ob- 
 " tained. 
 
 " According to those ideas, it is evident 
 * that the study ought to be commenced by 
 " some general inquiries into the composition and 
 " nature of material bodies, and the laws of their 
 " changes. The surface of the earth, the atmo-^ 
 " sphere, and the water deposited from it, must, J 
 " either together or separately, afford all the 
 " principles concerned in vegetation j and it is 
 " only . by examining the chemical nature of 
 " these principles, that we are capable of dis- 
 " covering what is the food of plants ; and the 
 " manner in which this food is supplied and pre- 
 " pared for their nourishment ; the principle of 
 " the constitution of .bodies, consequently, should 
 " fi^Herthe first subject for our consideration. 
 
 " By methods of analysis, dependent upon 
 " chemical and electrical instruments, discovered 
 " in late times, it has been ascertained that all 
 "the varieties of material substances may be 
 " resolved into a comparatively small number of 
 " bodies, which, as they are not capable of being 
 
66 ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE EARTH. 
 
 " decompounded, are considered, in the present 
 " state of chemical knowledge, as elements. 
 
 "The bodies incapable of decomposition at 
 " present known, are forty-seven ; ofthesej^lnrtj- 
 " eight are metals; six are inflammable bodies; 
 " and three substances, which unite with metals 
 " and inflammable bodies, ajid form with them 
 " acids, alkalies, earths, or other analogous com- 
 " pounds. 
 
 " The chemical composition of plants has, 
 . " within the last ten years, been elucidated 
 " bv the experiments of a number of chemical 
 " philosophers, both in this and other countries ; 
 " and it forms a beautiful part of general che- 
 " mistry. If the organs of plants be submit- 
 " ted to chemical analysis, it is found that their 
 " almost infinite diversity of form, depends upon 
 " different arrangements and combinations of a 
 " very few elements ; seldom more than seven or 
 " eight belong to them, and three constitute the 
 " greatest part of their organised matter. 
 
 " All the varieties of substances found in plants 
 " are produced from the sap, and the sap of plants 
 " is derived from water, or from the fluids in the 
 " soil, and it is altered by, or combined with, 
 " principles derived from the atmosphere." 
 
 And again : " If any fresh vegetable matter, 
 " which contains sugar, mucilage, starch, or 
 " other -of the vegetable compounds solyble in 
 
ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE EARTH. 67 
 
 ** water, be moistened and exposed to air, at a 
 " temperature of from 50 to 80, oxygene will 
 " soon be absorbed, and carbonic acid formed ; 
 " heat will be produced, and elastic fluids, prin- 
 " cipally carbonic acid, gaseous oxyde of car- 
 66 bon, and hydro- carbon ate will be evolved ; a 
 *' dark-coloured liquor of a slightly sour, or bit- 
 " ter taste, will likewise be formed, and if the 
 " process be suffered to continue for a time suffi- 
 " ciently long, nothing solid will remain, except 
 " earthy and saline matter, coloured black by 
 " charcoal. 
 
 " Animal matters are in general more liable to 
 " decompose than vegetable substances. Oxy* 
 ** gene is absorbed, and carbonic acid and am- 
 " monia formed in the process of putrefaction ; 
 " they produced compound elastic fluids, and 
 " likewise azote ; they afford dark-coloured acid, 
 " and oily fluids, and leave a residuum of salts' 
 " and earths mixed with a calcareous matter. The 
 " ammonia given off from animal compounds, in 
 " putrefaction, may be conceived to be formed 
 " at the time of their decomposition by the com- 
 " bination of hydrogene and azote. Except this 
 " matter, the other products of putrefaction are 
 " analogous to those afforded by the ferment- 
 " ation of vegetable substances ; an'd the soluble 
 
 " substances formed, abound in the elements, of 
 
 F '2 
 
68 ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE EARTH. 
 
 " which are the constituent parts of vegetables, 
 " in carbon, hydrogene, and oxygene. 
 
 " The circumstances necessary for the putre- 
 " faction of animal substances are similar to those 
 " required for the fermentation of vegetable sub- 
 " stances ; a temperature above the freezing 
 " point, the presence of water, and the presence 
 " of oxygene, at least in the first stage of the 
 " process." 
 
 He likewise says, " Soils in all cases consist of 
 " a mixture of different finely-divided earthy mat- 
 " ters, .with animal or vegetable substances, in a 
 " state of decomposition, and certain saline ingre- 
 " dients. The earthy matters are the true basis 
 " p^jthejtjQil ^ the other parts, whether natural, 
 " or artificially introduced, operate as manures. 
 " Four earths generally abound in the soils : the 
 41 aluminous, the siliceous, the calcareous, and the 
 " magnesian. These earths, I have discovered, 
 " consist of highly inflammable metals united to 
 " pure air or oxygene ; and they are not, as far 
 " as we know, decomposed or altered in vege- 
 tation." 
 
 Mr. Kirwan says, " All plants (except the 
 " sub-aqueous,) grow in a mixed earth, moist- 
 " ened with rain and dew, and exposed to the 
 " atmosphere. If this earth be chemically exa- 
 " mined, it will be found to consist of siliceous, 
 " calcareous, and argillaceous particles ; often 
 
ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE EARTH. 69 
 
 " also of magnesia in various proportions, a very 
 " considerable quantity of water, and some fixed 
 " air. The most fertile also contain a small 
 " portion of oil, roots of decayed vegetables, a 
 " coaly substance arising from putrefaction, 
 " some traces of marine acid, and gypsum. Oh 
 "the other hand, if vegetables be analyzed, 
 " they will be found to contain a large portion of 
 " water and charcoal, also of fat and essential 
 " oils, resins, gums, and vegetable acids ; all 
 " which are reducible to water, pure air, inflam- 
 " mable air, and charcoal ; a small portion of 
 " fixed alkali is also found ; some neutral salts, 
 " most commonly Epsom, tartar vitriolate, com- 
 " mon salts, and salts of sylvius. 
 
 Thus far, we may consider all things reducible 
 to primitive principles, or simple substances, and 
 the opinions of these great men are accordant : 
 our next object must be, to consider how those 
 principles or elementary substances are again \ 
 to be brought together, put into action, and ) 
 combined ; and particularly for the different pur- 
 poses of husbandry. Agreeably to the rules of 
 chemistry, to demonstrate tta correctness of an 
 
 . <rr#^U*3v V>v ^^*WW3*j|fc> 
 
 analysis or any body, it is required, that the 
 same body be again produced by a recombination 
 of the part& discovered, and this is called a syn- 
 
 , or Lu^U^f tEfYfa*, . . "T^ 
 
 thesis ; but although it is clearly obvious to the 
 
 A FS 
 
70 ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE EARTH. 
 
 most simple observer, that notwithstanding the 
 apparent ultimate destruction of every visible 
 substance, the same quantity of both animate 
 and inanimate substances always exist, and it 
 may be justly concluded, that the process of 
 nature is carried on by a kind of transmutation, 
 or change in the relative connection of matter, 
 brought about by certain processes of death and 
 decomposition, and restored again by the action 
 and dissemination of certain principles of life and 
 recomposition ; we cannot, by artificial means 
 alone, effect 6uch a combination of those princi- 
 ples, or elementary substances, as to form either 
 animals or vegetables, and we are therefore inca- 
 pable of demonstrating by synthesis. 
 
 On this point, Sir Humphry Davy remarks, 
 " What may be our ultimate view of the laws 
 " of chemistry, or how far our ideas of ele- 
 " mentary principles may be simplified, it is 
 " impossible to say ; we can only reason from, 
 
 " facts ; . we cannot imitate the powers of com- 
 
 y>^{le,e<Qa^i- A* 
 
 ;< position beloftgiHg-w vegetable structures, but, 
 
 " at least, w r e can understand them; and as far as 
 " our researches have undergone, it appears, that 
 " in vegetation, compound forms are uniformly . 
 " produced from simpler ones : and the elements * 
 " in ttomirfil, the atmosphere, and the earth, 
 " absorbed and .made parts of beautiful and 
 " diversified structures." 
 
71 
 
 ARRANGEMENT OF CHEMICAL PRINCIPLES, 
 AND PRACTICAL DEDUCTIONS. 
 
 BEFORE entering into a further inquiry of the 
 principles of any particular operations of husban- 
 dry, a general view of the workings of nature in 
 her various processes and proceedings, may ma- 
 terially assist in directing attention to the proper 
 points; for this purpose, the following explan- 
 ations and arrangement are offered. 
 
 All things that cpjisti^ 
 
 reducible to the same primitive or elementary 
 principles, viz. oxjgejie, hydjrogene, nitrogene, 
 carbon, and earth. The three first are permanent 
 elastic fluids, or gases; the fourth a permanent 
 substance; and although the earths are_prQYd by 
 Sir Humphry Davy, toJbe, compoundajofJii 
 inflammable metals and oxygene, it does not ap- 
 pear that they are found in any qtlier state than as 
 such compounds, in vegetables or animals; nor 
 that it is necessary they should be further subdi- 
 vided, either for the reproduction or suste- 
 nance of vegetables, or animals. I shall, there- 
 fore, take the liberty, in the pursuit of my 
 
72 ARRANGEMENT OF CHEMICAL PRINCIPLES, 
 
 subject,, to consider the earths as elementary 
 
 principles. / , y- 
 
 JP & ,/,,. i - f 
 
 Oxygene is the vital air of life, the principle 
 of combustion, and the vehicle of heat, the 
 pure air of Kirwan. 
 
 Hydrogene is the basis of inflammable air, 
 and is the lightest of all ponderable things, the 
 inflammable air of Kirwan. 
 
 Nitrogene or azote is the opposite of oxy- 
 gene, and is incapable of supporting combustion, 
 and animal life. 
 
 Carbon is the basis of common charcoal, 
 divested of all its impurities. 
 
 Atmospheric air is compounded of the two 
 different permanent substances, o_xjgene and 
 nitrogene, combining and uniting in certain 
 proportions, and rendered aerial by the expansive 
 power of heat or caloric. 
 
 Water^is^form^d., by the two permanent sub- 
 stances, oxygeng^jand Jiydiogene, combining or 
 uniting in certain proportions, and which, in its 
 common state, always holds a certain portion of 
 earth in a state of solution, and generally of 
 carbon also. 
 
 substanc^g_,arfi^mjbhem- 
 
 cpmj)iuedda.different , 
 form the wttpje of Jboth,ajiimals and 
 vegetables, it clearly appears that animal and 
 
 
AND PRACTICAL DEDUCTIONS. J3 
 
 vegetable matter^ in the general composition and 
 continuation of the world, is divisible only, and not 
 destructible j and that therejfore, as far as we are 
 able to comprehend, the animal and vegetable 
 parts of the creation are continued and sustained 
 by transmutation : or, in other words, that the \ 
 process of nature in creating and constructing* is 
 carried on hentimiedraios of compo- 
 sition and 
 
 Thus animals forming the superior part of 
 
 the creation, are endowed with the powers of 
 
 .'-* 
 48tr-oymg, ^afltieatkig, digesting, and decom- 
 
 posing the substances of both animals and 
 vegetables. 
 
 And veetables T^ariEWie^i^^^iea* 
 
 seem peculiarly designed by nature 
 ^A., * tL%^ |U^dp* ^- 7 . 
 BfctsoHiaaiyiMh "timtwu. i.H ffont**mig . th 
 
 
 animated world, by bringing the divided sub-( 
 stances again into union and action^"^* 
 
 Animals devour both animals and vegetables 
 to support themselves, and by this they are at 
 the same time made instrumental in preparing 
 the food of plants, by facilitating the decom- 
 position of both animals and vegetables. 
 
 From the peculiar organisation of vegetables, 
 their food can only be taken up in a state of 
 liquid, and water is the only vehicle by which it 
 can be administered, 
 
74 ARRANGEMENT OF CHEMICAL PRINCIPLES, 
 
 Whatsoever, therefore, constitutes the grand 
 invigorating or accumulatin&principle in the food 
 of plants, must be redu/cwfe to a soluble , state., 
 
 ><'/*--* t4 .ft*"*-- V^** A'jff'f <L ) * r}~?t "* f" 
 
 or be placed in a state of minute divisiajjjify^ ^ 
 Although water in its pure state contains hy- 
 drogene and oxygene only, as it is necessarily 
 brought in contact .with, or made to pass through 
 animal and vegetabTe^substances, (which are 
 always scattered over the surface, or contained 
 
 in the soil,) before it can conje within reach 
 
 ^ jkt,4~tr-^t*&& z* "* 
 
 of thg roots, it dissolves, OJtei.'Combit*cs and 
 
 carries^with it the carbonaceous matter.^^jj^ 
 Plants possess the power of decomposing wa- 
 
 -^i. f ' r rT ' I.. - 
 
 ter^^ndj^Ttge CQiqpQsition^if their own yarious^ 
 6ubstan_ces\of retaining and ^pplyin^ the carbon. 
 
 hjxlrogeiie, and earth, and a portion of oxygene,^ 
 
 and at the same time ofjen!ilij3g ^^ 
 oxygene as excrementitious. 
 
 Animals by respiration decompose the atmo- 
 spheric air, retaining the oxygene, and emitting 
 the nitrogene. 
 
 Animals and v^f^blesjg^ 
 
 and left to spontaneous decay, are. .de composed 
 by fermentation, and by this 'process, carbon, and 
 earth are deposited, and oxygene, which is in- 
 reased by absorption, is disposed of, by^part 
 formmg^cafbonic oxyde, and part carbonic acid 
 gas : thehydroggne and mtrjpgepe_ are 
 
AND PRACTICAL DEDUCTIONS. 75 
 
 as simple gases, or united as ammonia : the 
 hydrogen e also, is often combined with carbon, 
 forming carburetted hydrogene gas. 
 
 Carbonic acid^gaSj orjfixed^air, is formed by a 
 certain portion of carbon being dissolved and 
 held in solution or ^combination by oxygene, 
 and is more ponderous than atmospheric air. 
 
 is composed of carbon, and a 
 
 portion of oxygene less than sufficient to pro- 
 duce carbonic acid. j 
 
 Carburetted hydrogene gas, is carbon dissolved 
 in hydrogene, and is much lighter than atmo- Y 
 spheric air ; it is this gas by which balloons are 
 inflated, and which is burnt to give light, instead 
 of oil, &c. in lamps. 
 
 These elements being thus separated, are 
 again combined by the various processes of 
 
 nature. 
 
 By the combustion of electricity, the oxygene 
 
 gas^emitted by vegetables, and the hydrogene gas 
 by putrescent animal and vegetable matter, are 
 united and fojinjvjjjer ; and the proportions are 
 85 oxygene, and 15 hydrogene. By natural ja 
 nity, oxygene gas is combined with the nitrogene 
 gas, thrown off by the respiration of animals, 
 and atmospheric air formed ; and the proportions 
 are 22 oxygene, and 77 nitrogene. 
 
 Carbonic acid gas, from its density, is readily 
 
76 ARRANGEMENT OF CHEMICAL PRINCIPLES. 
 
 brought in contact with calcareous, carbona- 
 ceous, and metallic substances, and also with 
 water, and by these absorbed or decomposed. 
 
 Conformably to the preceding doctrines, the 
 cultivation of land, naturally is divided into 
 two important opejations,-~viz l /. 
 
 First, TK^^apfi^^mpi'oving^- ox -correcting 
 the^urfac^-of4fee-artl^ -and the sub-soil, that it 
 may receive and regulate a due supply of water, 
 and afford a proper accommodation for the roots 
 of vegetables. . v 
 
 Secondly, The regulating and furnishing the 
 needful supply of food for such plants, ancUfer 
 as it may be desirous to,cultiva1 
 sueh -iai*4&*~a8 the soil is test 
 
 adapted to support. 
 
 To be enabled to form a correct judgment on 
 these points, it will be necessary, first, to com- 
 prehend the nature and properties of the roots of 
 plants, and also of their stalks, branches, and 
 leaves. 
 
77 
 
 ON THE ROOTS OF PLANTS. 
 
 To give life and motion to the seeds of plants, 
 a certain portion of water, and of oxygene or 
 vital air, and a degree of heat of about 50 Fa- 
 renheit, is necessary. A seed being placed in 
 the earth under these circumstances, it imme- 
 diately absorbs moisture, and gradually swells | 
 to the extent of its shell, or skin, when the / 
 radicle, or first root, protrudes itself, and in \ 
 whatever position the seed be placed, assumes / 
 a perpendicular direction, and gradually makes \ , 
 its way downwards into the soil ; and the germeiT. } 
 also assumes a perpendicular position, and grows , 
 upwards. A great number of experiments have 
 been made to ascertain the peculiar principles, 
 which influence and give direction to the first 
 rudiments of plants, and many are recited by 
 Sir H. Davy ; but whether the first inclinations 
 of a plant be considered as instinctive, or whe- 
 ther, by the influence of any peculiar principle, 
 > the root is impelled forward into the earth, is 
 of trifling importance to the practical agricul- 
 turist : and whether it may be accounted for on 
 the principles of gravitation, or attraction, it is 
 
78 ON THE ROOTS OF PLANTS. 
 
 not necessary for my present purpose to discuss. 
 It ' is progressive in its growth, similar to the 
 branches, but in an inverted direction. 
 
 As the branches of a tree are formed by a 
 very tender and succulent point, pushing up- 
 wards into the air, so the root penetrates down- 
 wards into the earth ; but as it has to make its 
 way through the pores, or between the particles 
 composing the soil it is planted in, which is 
 often close and tenacious, its first projecting 
 points are wisely adapted to the purpose, by 
 being much more minute and compliable, which 
 enables it to advance almost as readily as water. 
 After a root has effected a passage, it is en- 
 dowed with considerable expansive and repul- 
 sive powers, and thereby enabled to make its 
 way, by pushing off on all sides the encumbering 
 soil. When the soil is but partially submissive, 
 the root accommodates itself to the cavity, ad- 
 mitting its increase, however rugged and irre- 
 gular. Roots are, notwithstanding, impatient of 
 resistance, and at all times evince a partiality 
 for that soil which is most accommodating, and 
 run most evenly and luxuriantly, where they 
 meet with the least resistance, and the greatest 
 supply of nutriment. 
 
 The office of the root is to collect and supply 
 i the food, which forms and determines the future 
 
 8* 
 
ON THE ROOTS OF PLANTS. 79 
 
 plant and its produce, and the constitution and 
 habits of the roots determine those of the stalk, 
 branches, and leaves ; if the roots grow luxuri- 
 antly, the branches will also. 
 
 A variety of means have been resorted to by 
 phytologists, to discover and ascertain the con- 
 struction and principles of action of the roots 
 of plants, and as various and contradictory have 
 been their opinions and representations ; but inx 
 the material point all agree; and the most mi- 
 nute examination, by the most powerful micros- 
 cope, confirms the fact, that the food of plants 
 can only be taken up by ^ thejropts i in a sta,te_of 
 solution in water, or suspended inji state of di- 
 vision, so minute as to be equal to a solution. 
 
 In a deep tenacious soil, or clay, roots can 
 only find a free passage through fissures or 
 clefts, which are formed by its occasional con- 
 traction, and as these openings are not very 
 numerous, or close together, the roots do not 
 divide much, or become fibrous, but those 
 which strike into them range wide and deep, 
 and getting beyond the general influence of the 
 sun and air, collect their food, or sap, from a 
 source ill adapted to fructification ; and, conse- 
 quently, plants under such circumstances are 
 generally fpund to be of a cold, aqueous, un- 
 healthy, and unprolific nature : on the contrary, 
 
80 ON THE ROOTS OF PLANTS. 
 
 when a soil is light, porous, and shallow, the 
 roots meeting no obstruction, divide and form 
 a great number of fibres, which ranging hori- 
 zontally, and being more exposed to the effect 
 of sun and air, incline a plant more to be- 
 come fructiferous than to an increase of wood, 
 or an extension of branches ; and in such a 
 situation, the greatest supply of food being ap- 
 propriated to the production of fruit or seed, 
 the plants grow less to stalk, branches, and leaf. 
 Hence it is very truly remarked by an inge- 
 nious writer on fruit trees, that " they produce 
 the most generous fruits when their roots spread 
 near the surface of the earth," and whether we 
 consider such effects to be produced by the 
 roots being kept more within the influence of 
 the sun and air, or by the peculiar nature of 
 the food supplied by the soil in such a situa- 
 tion, it operates in support of one and the same 
 conclusion, viz. that it is necessary the roots 
 should be kept near the surface ; for whether 
 that which supplies the food of plants be a red, 
 a black, or a brown loam, or sand, or clay, the 
 
 induce fructification, and produce the most 
 perfect seed and fruit, and the most abundant 
 quantity, can only be furnished within a certain 
 depth. 
 
ON THE ROOTS OF PLANTS. 81 
 
 Thus the roots having collected and absorbed, 
 or taken in, a supply of food or nutriment, for 
 the sustenance of the plant, the next object 
 for consideration is, how, or in what manner, or 
 by what means, such food is disposed of, and 
 appropriated to the uses of the plant, and to the 
 formation of its various substances ; and this I 
 shall proceed to show is determined by the 
 leaves, stalk, and branches. 
 
ON THE USE AND OFFICES OF THE LEAVES, &c. 
 
 UPON what principles, and by what application 
 of power, the rise of the sap from the roots, 
 and its distribution and transformation into the 
 different parts and produce of the plant, is con- 
 ducted, is a question that has long been agi- 
 tated, and which has given rise to much spe- 
 culation, argument, and difference of opinion 
 among the learned. The use and office of the 
 leaves of plants, also, have been a subject as fully 
 argued and discussed, and with as little prac- 
 tical effect ; but these objects are of much more 
 importance than is generally considered by agri- 
 culturists. The nutriment being received from 
 the root into the stalk, becomes what is termed 
 the sap, and this is sent forward and appro- 
 priated to the different purposes of the plant, 
 in which process the leaves will be found to be 
 agents of great influence in determining the 
 produce. 
 
 Many describe the sap in vegetables as circu- 
 lating, like the blood of animals, through an 
 appropriate system of vessels -, whilst others deny 
 
ON THE USE AND OFFICES, &C. 83 
 
 the possibility of such circulation, or even the 
 existence of such vessels. 
 
 Bradley says, " The many curious observa- 
 " tions which have been made concerning the 
 " structure of animal bodies, and what Dr. 
 " Grew, Malpigius, and myself have remarked, 
 " in the structure of vegetables, may ascertain 
 "to us, that life, whether it be animal or vege* 
 " table, must be maintained by a due circula- 
 " tion and distribution of juices in the bodies 
 " they are to support." 
 
 " The sap circulates in the vessels of plants 
 " much after the same manner as the blood 
 " doth in the bodies of animals." And after a 
 variety of abstruse arguments, he says, " In 
 " fine, a plant is like an alembic, which distils 
 " the juices of the earth ; as, for example, the 
 " roots having sucked in the salts of the earth, 
 " and thereby filled itself with proper juices for 
 " the nourishment of the tree, these juices then 
 " are set in motion by the heat, that is, they 
 " are made to evaporate into steam, as the mat- * 
 " ter in a still will do when it begins to warm. 
 " Now as soon as this steam, or vapour, rises 
 " from the root, its own natural quality carries A 
 
 " it upwards to meet the air j it enters then the 
 " mouths of the several arterial vessels, arrives 
 " at the extreme parts of them, i. the buds 
 
 G 2 
 
84 ON THE USE AND OFFICES 
 
 " of a tree, it there meets with cold enough to 
 " condense it into a liquor, as the vapour in' a 
 " still is known to do ; in this form it returns 
 " to the root down the vessels, which do the 
 " office of veins, lying between the wood and 
 " the inner bark, leaving, as it passeth by, such 
 " parts of the juices as the texture of the bark 
 " will receive and require for its support." 
 
 Miller says, " The notion of the circulation 
 * was entertained by several authors much about 
 " the same time, without any communication 
 " one with another, particularly M. Major, a 
 " physician at Hamburgh, M. Peracett, Mari- 
 " otte, and Malpighi : it has met, however, with 
 " some considerable opposers, particularly the 
 " excellent M. Doddart, who could never be 
 " reconciled to it. 
 
 " M. Doddart, instead of the same juices 
 " going and returning, contends for two several 
 " juices ; the one imbibed from the soil, digested 
 *"' in the root, and from thence transmitted to the 
 " extremes of the branches, for the nourishment 
 " of the plant ; the other received from the 
 " moisture of the air, entering in at the extremes 
 *'* of the branches; so that the ascending and 
 " descending juices are not the same." 
 
 Mr. Knight is also an advocate for the doc- 
 trine of circulation, and has published a variety 
 
OF THE LEAVES, &C. 85 
 
 of papers reciting a number of experiments that 
 he made, and which he considered to confirm 
 the fact. And Sir H. Davy conforms to his 
 opinions, and says, " In all plants there exists 
 ** a system of tubes or vessels, which, in one.ex- 
 " tremity, terminates in the roots, and at the 
 " other in leaves. It is by the capillary action 
 " of the roots, that fluid matter is taken up from 
 " the soil. The sap, in passing upwards, be- 
 " comes denser, and more fitted to deposit solid 
 " matter ; it is modified by exposure to heat, 
 " light, and air, in the leaves ; descends through 
 " the bark, in its progress produces new organ- 
 " ised matter, and is thus, in its vernal and 
 " autumnal flow, the cause of the formation of 
 " new parts, and of the more perfect evolution 
 " of parts already formed." 
 
 But Mrs. Ibbetson, (a lady who has studied 
 the organism of plants, aided by a powerful 
 solar microscope, and whose observations and 
 descriptions are published in a series of papers 
 in Nicholson's Philosophical Journal,) after giv- 
 ing a variety of reasons which induce her to 
 conclude that the sap does not circulate, says, 
 "How strange, then, to alter all this beautiful 
 " arrangement, justified, indeed taught by dis- 
 " section, in order to find a place for sap- vessels, 
 " that cannot possibly require any. For why? 
 
 G 3 
 
OO ON THE USE AND OFFICES 
 
 / 
 
 " must they have returning vessels ? Is there 
 " not a great difference between an animal which, 
 " after the first few years, has no increase, and 
 " a being that increases from every joint, and is 
 " supposed, therefore, to draw up only those juices 
 " necessary for that increase j especially as the sap 
 " is the liquid of the earth, not the blood of the 
 " tree, as is easily proved by adding nurture to 
 " the ground, when the sap fails, which soon 
 " restores it ? Besides, how is the circulation 
 " to be effected in the eternally increasing 
 " branches of a tree, whose every additional 
 " twig must make a variation in the quantity of 
 "juices wanted? Whereas, it is naturally de- 
 " creased as it mounts, by throwing out new 
 " shoots and branches, which expend the liquor 
 " as it rises. And I believe I may say, that I 
 " am now so well acquainted with all the differ- 
 " ent vessels of a tree, that I can no longer fail 
 " from ignorance : but here, except the inner 
 " bark vessels all proceed in a different direc- 
 " tion, either round the tree, or from the centre 
 " to the circumference, how is it possible that 
 " such large and powerful parts should be in- 
 " visible ? 
 
 " The use of dissection is to correct the use 
 " of imagination, or those experiments which 
 " have that effect, forcing the juices into chan- 
 
OF THE LEAVES, &C. 87 
 
 " nels foreign to that which nature had appointed 
 " for them. I have before said, that I have ever 
 " found nature disposed to such resources, in 
 " case of any unnatural impediment. I have 
 " myself proved it." 
 
 The effect of grafting shows that the sap does 
 not circulate ; or, at any rate, if it does circu- 
 late, that it undergoes no change by the ascend- 
 ing and descending motion : and this also shows 
 the fact, that every part of a plant possesses the 
 power of selecting and transforming the portion 
 of fluid destined to its use as it passes up. 
 
 If the sap be passed through the body of a tree 
 to its leaves, and there prepared and returned 
 back, that part of the tree which is uppermost, 
 and producing one variety of wood and fruit, must 
 possess the power of preparing the fluids for the 
 production of every other variety below it, unless 
 the sap be supposed to pass up and return in the 
 same state, which amounts to a superfluity of 
 motion, and an excess of exertion, seldom found 
 in nature. This subject has always excited con- 
 troversy among phytologists, and notwithstand- 
 ing the great variety of ingenious and elaborate 
 experiments that have been made, they not only 
 have not been sufficiently conclusive to produce 
 unanimity of opinion, but the subtle and prolix 
 arguments that have been adduced on both sides 
 
88 THE USE AND OFFICES 
 
 of the question, have operated more to confuse 
 than benefit the practical gardener or husband- 
 man, and have induced a careless destruction, 
 rather than an effectual protection, of the leaves 
 of plants. 
 
 The leaves, however, will be found to form a 
 most important part in the structure of a plant, 
 and to be destined to perform an essential office 
 in the process of vegetation. 
 
 Miller, in speaking of fruit-trees, says, " If 
 " the shoots have not a leading bud where it is 
 " cut, it is certain to die down to the next 
 " leading bud ; so that what fruit may be pro- 
 " duced above that, will come to nothing, there 
 " being always a necessity of a leading bud to 
 " attract the nourishment ; for it is not suffici- 
 " ent that they have a leaf bud, as some have 
 " imagined, since that will attract but a small 
 " quantity of nourishment. The great use of 
 " the leaves being, to perspire away such crude 
 "juices as are unfit to enter the fruit." 
 
 Again, " If we consider that the leaves are 
 " absolutely necessary to cherish the blossom- 
 " buds, which are always formed at the foot- 
 " stalks of the leaves, so pulling them off, before 
 " they have performed the office assigned them 
 " by nature, is doing great injury to the trees." 
 
 The Rev. Mr. Hales, in his Treatise on Vege- 
 
OF THE LEAVES, &C. 89 
 
 table Statics, giving an account of an experiment 
 he instituted to prove the use of leaves in plants^ 
 says, " That boughs of trees with leaves on them, 
 " placed in glasses containing known quantities 
 " of water, imbibed, some twenty, some thirty 
 " ounces in twenty hours, 4 a y> niore or less, 
 " in proportion to the quantity of leaves they 
 " had, and when he weighed them at night they 
 ** were lighter than in the morning ; while those 
 " without leaves, imbibed but one ounce, and 
 " were heavier in the evening than in the morn- 
 " ing, they having perspired little." 
 
 This eminent author also says, " It is plain, 
 " from the many experiments and observations 
 " before mentioned, that leaves are very ser- 
 " viceable in this work of vegetation, by being 
 " instrumental in bringing nourishment from the 
 " lowest part within the reach of the attraction 
 " of the growing fruit ; which, like young ani- 
 " mals, are furnished with proper instruments to 
 " suck it thence. But the leaves seem also de- 
 " signed for many other noble and important 
 " services, for nature admirably adapts her in- 
 " struments, so as to be at the same time service- 
 " able to many good purposes." 
 
 Mrs. Ibbetson cites a number of experiments 
 she made, to prove that plants do not perspire : 
 she, however, admits that plants continually give 
 
90 ON THE USE AND OFFICES 
 
 out oxygene while the sun shines, and in this 
 particular all naturalists and physiologists agree. 
 Jt was a maxim of the great Sir Isaac Newton, 
 that in all scientific investigations of the opera- 
 tions of nature, for the purpose of ascertaining, 
 establishing, and producing causes and effects, 
 substances should not be unnecessarily multi- 
 plied. 
 
 If, then, in conformity with this, and as be- 
 fore explained, we suppose the food of plants to 
 be water, holding in solution carbonaceous mat- 
 ter, and that the roots take up this liquid, and 
 that plants have the power of decomposing it 
 water being composed of oxygene and hydro- 
 gene the hydrogene and carbon might be com- 
 pounded in different proportions with a portion 
 of oxygene, and formed into the different sub- 
 stances of the plant, and the remainder given 
 out as gas ; and then we have only to believe 
 that the leaves are essential to the process, and 
 the fact cited by Dr. Hales, that plants absorb 
 and dispose of water, will be sustained, and 
 many jarring opinions will be reconciled. 
 
 Admitting that a plant receives food, to sus- 
 tain and extend itself, for the various purposes 
 required by nature, and that, in this respect, it 
 is similar to animals, may we not suppose, that 
 as no animal is known to appropriate the whole 
 
OF THE LEAVES, &C. 91 
 
 of the food it takes into the stomach, to the in- 
 crease of its permanent substance, a consider- 
 able portion being thrown off as excrement, 
 plants also appropriate a part only, and throw 
 off the remainder as excrementitious ? And if 
 so, what part of a plant appears so likely to be 
 prepared for this purpose as the leaves ? The 
 food being taken up as a liquid, and duly ap- 
 plied to the needful purposes of the plant, the 
 superfluous part of the oxygene might be passed 
 off in vapour or gas, and the hydrogene, carbon, 
 &c. with the leaves, 
 
 A very important question is also quoted by 
 Miller, as put by the Rev. Mr. Hales, in addition 
 to some queries by Sir Isaac Newton : " And 
 " may not light also, by freely entering the ex- 
 " panded surfaces of leaves and branches, contri- 
 " bute much to enobling the principles of vege- 
 " tables?" Which must certainly be answered in 
 the affirmative, if, by enobling vegetables, is to 
 be understood, their being put in a proper state 
 to produce blossoms, fruit, and seed, in maturity. 
 It is not only obvious, that without light, vegeta- 
 bles will not produce blossoms or seed, but that, 
 in proportion as plants, or any parts of plants, 
 from being crowded together, overshadow each 
 other, so will they be deficient in produce. The 
 most simple appearance and habits of every plant 
 
9 ON THE USE AND OFFICES 
 
 clearly, demonstrate the absolute necessity of 
 light, to stimulate and sustain the generating 
 faculty ; which is the grand object of our labour 
 and study in that part of agriculture immediately 
 under consideration. 
 
 It may further be observed, that it is an un- 
 deviating law of nature, that no plant shall 
 produce blossoms, or fruit, until it be furnished 
 with a surface of branches, stalk, and leaves, 
 proportioned to the quantity of fluids supplied 
 by the roots. 
 
 Thus we find, that if two plants are placed, 
 one in a rich luxuriant soil, and the other in a 
 poor dry soil, the supply of food collected by 
 the roots of the one in the rich soil will be 
 large, and consequently the roots, branches, 
 and leaves, will be large. The supply furnished 
 by that in a poor dry soil will be small, and 
 the surface of the stem, branches, and leaves, 
 will be small ; and thus the surface of the trunk, 
 branches, and leaves, being in each case in due 
 proportion to the annual produce of fluids, (pro- 
 vided each be alike exposed to light and heat,) 
 will each alike, in point of time, attain maturity, 
 and produce seed or fruit. 
 
 Plants growing close together, run up tall, 
 which is occasioned, by a natural propensity to 
 spread and expose their surfaces to the sun and 
 
OF THE LEAVES, &C. Q3 
 
 air, each continuing to grow more in height 
 than the other, until it is beyond obstruction. 
 Hence those plants that are grown in a clump 
 are always the shortest on the outside, for as 
 these are sooner satiated, they stop and allow 
 the others to overtop them. 
 
 Every artificial means resorted to by garden- 
 ers, to force plants to a fructiferous state, is de- 
 termined by this law, and whether by forcing 
 and facilitating an extension of surface by ar- 
 tificial heat, or shelter ; or by lessening the sup- 
 ply of sap, by curtailing its roots, or channels of 
 conveyance, the effect is the same. 
 
 This law, indeed, which determines the 
 growth and produce of a plant, is very similar 
 to that which governs the process of evaporation. 
 
 As the evaporation and inspissation of a fluid, 
 are determined by the extent of surface, ex- 
 posed to the action of heat, the preparation of 
 the fluids in a plant for fructification appear to 
 be governed. Thus if a vessel, presenting a 
 certain surface, be deprived of one- half of its 
 contents, the remaining half will be evaporated, 
 or inspissated, in the same time that the whole 
 would have been, if placed in a vessel exposing 
 double the extent of surface. We may, there- 
 fore conclude, that as it is the law of nature, 
 
94f ON THE USE AND OFFICES 
 
 that in an open vessel, containing a liquid, the 
 greater the surface of the liquid exposed, the 
 greater will be the quantity evaporated in a 
 given time, and the greater the quantity of ex- 
 tractive matter prepared ; so it is with vege- 
 tables, the greater the surface of leaves and 
 branches exposed to the light, and the influence 
 of the sun and air, the greater the quantity of 
 fluid disposed of, by being digested, appro- 
 priated, and expelled ; and the greater the quan- 
 tity, and richer the quality of food and sap 
 Supplied, and raised by capillary attraction, or 
 otherwise ; the greater the quantity and richer 
 the quality of the matter furnished, to be re- 
 tained and appropriated by every part of the 
 plant to its various purposes, either of genera- 
 tion, or of substantial increase. 
 
 Again, the fruit of a plant being considered, 
 as requiring for its formation, a regularly pro- 
 portioned arrangement of its organs, and a due 
 supply of healthy sustenance, we may trace the 
 progress of nature to this effect, on the fore- 
 going principles, more clearly than by the doc- 
 trines of circulation, gravitation, or any other 
 theory that has been suggested ; and we may 
 conclude that it is with vegetables, as with ani- 
 mals, required to sustain health, that the graad 
 
OF THE LEAVES, &C. 95 
 
 machinery be preserved uninjured and com- 
 plete ; and in conformity with this, if we wish 
 to limit the size, or surface of plants, we must 
 limit the food ; this is the only check, or te* 
 straint, nature will admit of, without entailing 
 future loss. 
 
 That her great work of creation and propa- 
 gation, may not be obstructed and retarded in 
 vegetables, by the accidental privations they are 
 subject to, from being made subservient to the 
 use of animals ; nature, all bountiful in her pro- 
 vision, and ever fertile in resources, has given 
 them the power within themselves, to a great ex- 
 tent, of repairing and retrieving their losses ; 
 and to this end, every plant and every branch, is 
 furnished with more buds than are required for 
 the immediate formation of branches or blos- 
 soms, so that if one be destroyed, another may 
 be ready to take its place, and prevent a waste 
 of time, or surface ; thus we find that the ef- 
 forts of a plant, from the seed forwards, are to 
 attain and acquire, the surface proportioned by 
 its nature, to the supply of food, necessary to 
 enable it, to fructify, and propagate its species ; 
 and the juices continue to flow until it has ob- 
 tained this required extent. 
 
 From the preceding observations it must be 
 
96 ON THE USE AND OFFICES 
 
 concluded, that although the leaves of plants, 
 may in themselves, be of little value in contri- 
 buting to the nutriment of mankind, they form 
 an essential part in their organisation, for the 
 production of seed and fruit, the quantity and 
 quality of which will be in proportion to the 
 condition, or state of health, and exposure of 
 the stalk, leaves, &c. : this may readily be de- 
 monstrated, by placing plants under the circum- 
 stances of both extremes ; thus, if the leaves of 
 a seedling plant of wheat, or a turnip, or a 
 potatoe, be removed as fast as they appear, 
 neither seeds, bulbs, or tubers, will be produced 
 in any quantity, or quality, worthy of notice ; but 
 if the leaves of such plants are preserved, and 
 allowed a space sufficient to expand their full 
 extent, and be open to the influence of the sun 
 and air, they will attain the utmost size and 
 state of prolificacy the soil, and quantity and 
 quality of food, is capable of producing. 
 
 The capacity of a soil, and the distance plants 
 ought to be placed from each other, may rea- 
 dily be determined, by allowing a few plants a 
 larger space than they will probably occupy ; 
 and the space they then cover by their leaves, 
 may be taken as the distance required by each 
 plant, to enable it to attain perfection. 
 
OF THE LEAVES, &C. 
 
 Plants that are excluded from the presence of 
 the sun and light, and the free circulation of 
 air, give out carbonic acid gas : thus when plants 
 are crowded together and overshadow each 
 other, they are, by a waste of their carbon, 
 thrown off as carbonic acid gas, debilitated and 
 deprived of the needful stamina; which is often 
 followed by sterility, putrefaction, disease, and 
 death. 
 
 An attention to these principles will enable 
 the husbandman, with great accuracy, to judge 
 of the difference between thick and thin sowing, 
 and to determine the proper medium ; and will 
 show the folly of removing or destroying the 
 leaves of plants designed to produce seed, fruit, 
 or roots, until these are perfected. 
 
 ii 
 
98 
 
 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 THE food of plants has for a long time been 
 considered an object of importance, by natural 
 philosophers, and a great variety of experiments 
 have been made, to ascertain what it consists of, 
 and in what state of preparation it is most 
 readily and effectually applied ^ and many con- 
 clusions have been drawn, and conjectures 
 formed. As before explained, the earth, ani- 
 mals, and vegetables, have been analyzed, and 
 their component parts minutely described, by 
 men of the greatest talents and learning ; but as 
 yet no one has arranged and described such a 
 system of cultivation as will enable a person to 
 trace effects to their causes on just scientific 
 principles. Much has been founded on conjee 
 ture, and much still remains to be determined 
 by practical observation and demonstration. 
 
 Vegetables, like animals, vary in their natuie 
 and habits, and like them have their peculiar 
 food; and although the food of plants may ge- 
 nerally be composed of the same elements, it 
 varies in the proportion of its composition, and 
 thereby becomes adapted to different purposes : 
 thus we find that a soil, which will furnish food 
 
 8* 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 99 
 
 enough to support one plant of a peculiar kind, 
 will at the same time furnish sufficient to sustain 
 many others of different species. 
 
 Bradley, in the work I have before noticed, 
 says, " Land animals may be likened in general 
 " to those plants which are called terrene, for 
 " that they live only upon the earth, such as 
 " oak, elm, beech, &c. ; amphibious animals, 
 " such as otters, beavers, tortoises, frogs, &c., 
 " which live as well on the land as in the 
 " waters, may be compared to the willows, 
 " alders, minths, &c. The fish kind, or aquatic 
 " race, whether of the rivers, or the sea, are 
 " analogous to the water plants, such as water 
 " lilies, water plantains, &c. which live only in the 
 " fresh waters, or the fuci, &c., which are sea 
 " or salt water plants, and not any of these will 
 " live out of its own element ; from whence 
 " we may conclude, how improper it would be 
 " to plant a water lily on a dry sandy desert, 
 " or an oak at the bottom of the sea, which 
 " would be just as reasonable as if we propose 
 " to feed a dog with hay, or a horse with fish: 
 " however, this rule of nature has been so little 
 " observed, even by some of our greatest plant- 
 " ers, that we can hardly boast of good suc- 
 " cess, in one out of five plantations that have 
 
 " been made." 
 
 H 2 
 
100 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 He also says, " I shall beg leave to remark, 
 " that as the several land animals have their re- 
 " spective diets, so have the terrene plants their 
 " several soils, from whence they derive their 
 " nourishment ; as some animals feed on flesh, 
 " others on fish, &c., so do plants love, some 
 " clay, others loam, sand, or gravel. Nor is this 
 " all we ought to observe ; we must consider, 
 " likewise, how beneficial to every plant is a 
 " right exposure ; whether in a vale, the sides 
 " or tops of hills, exposed to the south or north 
 " winds ; whether inland, or near the sea, for 
 " it is a proper exposure that keeps a plant in 
 health." 
 
 Bradley, Hitt, and Miller, consider the food 
 of plants to be salts, which every species of earth 
 more or less contains within itself; and that 
 according to the proportion of salts, contained 
 in each kind of soil or manure, will its proli- 
 ficacy be. f 
 
 That soils, and vegetable and animal matters, 
 may be found to produce salts, under certain 
 circumstances and chemical processes, I have no 
 doubt ; but this does not prove it to be necessary 
 that every substance, or any substance, con- 
 taining the basis or elements of salts, should 
 undergo this process, and be formed into 
 salts, before it can be in a state to constitute 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 101 
 
 food fit for the reception and nourishment of 
 plants. 
 
 Salts are various in their nature and general 
 effects, when placed in contact with other sub- 
 stances. 
 
 I have made many experiments with sea-salt, 
 nitre, soda, barilla, alum, &c., and have never 
 found them operate as a proportional addition of 
 food may be expected to do. 
 
 The opinions of Drs. Smith and Pearson on this 
 subject appear more rational. They say, that salts, 
 as they operate in promoting vegetation, are ana- 
 logous to mustard, cinnamon, ginger, &c., which 
 are not of themselves at all, or necessarily nu- 
 tritious, but contribute to render other things 
 nutritious, by exciting the action of the stomach 
 and other organs of digestion and assimilation. 
 Salts being considered to operate in this manner, 
 in promoting vegetation, we are naturally led to 
 their proper application, that is, in small quan- 
 tities, or in a state of weak solution. ^ 
 
 Notwithstanding all that has* been said to es- 
 tablish the opinion, that sea-salt is a valuable 
 manure, I am convinced it never can, as an 
 article of food, contribute to the increase of any 
 vegetable ; but as a chemical agent, by destroying, 
 and facilitating the decomposition, of animals and 
 
 H 3 
 
102 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 vegetables, or by its deliquiescence it may in 
 some instances increase the fertility of the soil. 
 
 Alkaline salts, no doubt, facilitate the solu- 
 tion of many animal and vegetable substances j 
 they also increase the divisibility, change the com- 
 bination, and otherwise exert an influence on the 
 soil itself, in a manner that adds much to its 
 fertility ; indeed, there are many reasons for be- 
 lieving that alkaline salts increase the fertility 
 of soils, and the fertilizing powers of manures, 
 when mixed or combined with them : the 
 urine of cows, horses, &c., always contain a 
 portion of alkaline salts, and this is more fer- 
 tilizing than the dung of those animals. By 
 the reduction of vegetables by fire, alkaline salts 
 are produced; and the action of fire on the 
 soil generally adds to its fertility : indeed, in a 
 great number of experiments, made with a view 
 to ascertain the most fertilizing, and the most 
 readily applicable and operative manure, or food 
 for plants ;' I have found the serum, or the watery 
 part of blood, diluted with six or eight times its 
 bulk of water, and given to plants in the same 
 quantity, and in the same manner, as when 
 supplying them with water, once or twice only 
 in the year, to produce the most immediate, 
 and most fertilizing effects of any thing ; whilst 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 103 
 
 the crassamentum, or clotted part of blood, left 
 to nature, was not beneficially operative, until 
 decomposed, and even then, was nothing equal 
 to the serum in its effects; and the difference 
 in the composition of those separate substances, 
 is, that serum contains one-fortieth of alkaline 
 salts, and the clot none. But if the clotted 
 part of blood be broken small, and well mixed 
 with three times its bulk of water, in which 
 potash, in the proportion of one-fortieth part 
 the weight of the blood, be dissolved ; the blood 
 will be reduced, and the liquid be rendered 
 equally effective as the serous part. And if 
 the clotted part be mixed with as much slacked 
 lime as will form it into a thick paste, it will dis- 
 solve, and be immediately applicable ; but is not 
 so immediately efficacious as the solution by salts. 
 It, however, must be remarked, that clotted blood, 
 mixed with quick lime, and left drying for a short 
 time, will not dissolve, and is rendered useless. 
 Mr. Kirwan, after describing the analysis be- 
 fore quoted, observes, " Hence we see on the 
 " last analysis, the only substances common to 
 " the growing vegetables, and the soils in 
 " which they grow, are, water, coal, different 
 " earths and salts ; these, therefore, are the true 
 " food of vegetables : to them we should also 
 " add fixed air, though by reason of its decompo- 
 
 H 4 
 
104 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 " sition, it may not be distinctly found in them, 
 " or, at least, not distinguished from that newly 
 " formed, during their decomposition. 5 ' 
 
 He also says, " The agency of water, in the 
 " process of vegetation, has not till of late 
 " been distinctly perceived. Dr. Hales has 
 " shown, that in the summer months, a sun- 
 " flower, weighing three pounds, avoirdupois, and 
 " regularly watered every day, passed through 
 "it, or perspired, twenty- two ounces each day ; 
 " that is, half its weight. 
 
 " Dr. Woodward found that a sprig of com- 
 " mon spearmint a plant that thrives best in 
 " moist soils, weighing only 28.25 grs., passed 
 " through it 3004 grs. in 77 days, between July 
 " and October, that is, somewhat more than 
 " its whole weight each day ; he did more, for 
 " he found that in that space of time, the plant 
 " increased 17 grs. in weight, and yet had no 
 " other food but pure rain water ; but he also 
 " found that it increased more in weight when it 
 " lived on spring water, and still more when its 
 " food was Thames water. Secondly, that the 
 " water they thus pass, nourishes them merely 
 " as water, without taking any foreign substance 
 " into account; for 3000 grs. of rain water, in 
 " Dr. Woodward's experiments, afforded an in- 
 ' crease of 17 grs. : whereas, by Margraaf s ex- 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 105 
 
 " periment, 5760 grs. of that water contain only 
 " one-third of a grain of earth. But, thirdly, it 
 " also follows, that water contributes still more to 
 " the nourishment of plants, besides the service it 
 " renders them in distributing the nutritive parts 
 *' throughout the whole structure, forming itself 
 " a constituent part of all of them, as may be un- 
 " derstood from modern experiments. Dr. Injen- 
 " houz, and M. Senebier have shown, that the 
 " leaves of plants exposed to the sun, produced 
 " pure air: now water has of late been proved to 
 " contain about 8.7 per cent, of pure air, the re- 
 " mainder being inflammable air. Water is then 
 " decomposed by the assistance of light within the 
 " vegetable ; its inflammable part is employed in the 
 "formation of oils, resins, gums, <r. Its pure 
 " air is partly applied to the production of vege- 
 " table acids, and partly expelled as excrement." 
 He further says, " To M. Hazenfrez we owe 
 " the discovery that coal is an essential ingre- 
 " dient in the food of all vegetables. Though 
 " hitherto little attended to, it appears to be 
 " one of the primeval principles, as ancient as 
 " the present constitution of our globe ; for it is 
 " formed in fixed air, of which it constitutes 
 " above one-fourth part, and fixed air exists in 
 "lime-stones, and other substances, which date 
 " from the first origin of things. 
 
106 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 " Coal not only forms the residuum of all ve- 
 " getable substances that have undergone a slow 
 " and smothered combustion, (that is, to which 
 " the free access of air has been prevented,) but 
 " also of all putrid vegetable and animal bodies. 
 " Hence it is found in vegetable and animal 
 " manures that have undergone putrefaction, and 
 " is the true basis of their ameliorating powers. 
 " If the water that passes through a putrefying 
 " dunghill be examined, it will be found of a 
 " brown colour, and if subjected to evaporation, 
 " the principal parts of the residuum will be 
 " found to consist of coal. All soils steeped in 
 " water, communicate the same colour to it in 
 " proportion to their fertility ; and this water 
 " being evaporated, leaves also a coal, as Hazen- 
 " frez and Fourcroy attest." 
 
 And again, " Hazenfraz and Fourcroy attest, 
 " that shavings of wood, being left in a moist 
 " place for nine or ten months, began to receive 
 " the fermentative motion ; and being then 
 " spread on land, putrefied after some time, and 
 " proved an excellent manure. Coal, however, 
 " cannot produce its beneficial effects but inas- 
 " much as it is soluble in water. The means of 
 " rendering it soluble are not as yet well ascer- 
 " tained : nevertheless, it is even now used as 
 " a manure, and with good effect" 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 107 
 
 " In truth, the fertilizing power of putrid 
 " animal and vegetable substances were pretty 
 " fully known even in the remotest ages ; but 
 " most speculatists have hitherto attributed them 
 " to the oleaginous, mucilaginous, or saline par- 
 " tides then developed ; forgetting that land is 
 " fertilized by paring and burning, though the 
 " oleaginous and mucilaginous particles, are 
 " thereby consumed or reduced to a coal. And 
 " the quantity of mucilage, oil, or salt in fertile 
 " land, is so small, that it could not contribute 
 " the one-thousandth part of the weight of any 
 " vegetable. Whereas coal is not only supplied 
 " by the land, but also by fixed air combined 
 " with the earths, and also by that which is con- 
 " stantly let loose by various processes, and soon 
 " precipitates by superiority of its specific gra- 
 " vity, and is then condensed in or mechanically 
 " absorbed by soils, or contained in dew." 
 
 Sir Humphry Davy says, " The necessity of 
 " water to vegetation, and the luxuriancy of the 
 " growth of plants, connected with the presence 
 " of moisture, in the southern countries of the 
 " old continent, led to the opinion so prevalent 
 " in the early schools of philosophy, that water 
 " was the great productive element, the sub- 
 " stance from which all things were capable of 
 " being composed, and into which they were 
 
108 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 " finally resolved. Van Helmont, in 1610, con- 
 " ceived that he had proved by a decisive expe- 
 " riment, that all the products of vegetables were 
 " capable of being generated from water. His 
 " results were shown to be fallacious by Wood- 
 " ward, in 1691. But the true use of water in 
 " vegetation was unknown till 1785, when Mr. 
 " Cavendish made the grand discovery, that it 
 " was composed of two elastic fluids or gases, 
 " inflammable gas or hydrogene, and vital gas 
 " or oxygene. 
 
 " Air, like water, was regarded as a pure 
 " element by most of the ancient philosophers. 
 " A few of the chemical enquirers in the six- 
 " teenth and seventeenth centuries formed some 
 " happy conjectures respecting its real nature. 
 " Sir Kenelrn Digby, in 1660, supposed that it 
 " contained some saline matter, which was an 
 " essential food of plants. Boyle, Hooke, and 
 " Mayow, between 1665 and 1680, stated that 
 " a small part of it only was consumed in the 
 " respiration of animals, and in the combustion 
 " of inflammable bodies. But the true statistical 
 " analysis of the atmosphere is comparatively a 
 " recent labour, achieved towards the end of 
 " the last century, by Scheele, Priestley, and 
 '*' Lavoisier. These celebrated men showed that 
 ic its principal elements are two gases, oxygene 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 109 
 
 u and azote, of which the first is essential to 
 " flame, and to the life of animals ; and that it 
 " likewise contains small quantities of aqueous 
 " vapour, and of carbonic acid gas : and Lavoi- 
 " sier proved that this last body is itself a com- 
 " pound elastic fluid, consisting of charcoal dis- 
 " solved in oxygene. 
 
 " Jethro Tull, in his Treatise on Horsehoeing, 
 " published in 1733, advanced the opinion, that 
 " minute earthy particles supplied the whole 
 " nourishment of the vegetable world. That 
 " air and water were chiefly useful in producing 
 " these particles from the land ; and that ma- 
 " nures acted in no other way than in ameliorat- 
 " ing the texture of the soil : in short, that their 
 " agency was mechanical. This ingenious au- 
 " thor of the new system of agriculture, having 
 " observed the excellent effects produced in 
 " farming, by a minute division of the soil, and 
 " the pulverization of it, by exposure to dew 
 " and air, was misled by carrying his principles 
 " too far. Duhamel, in a work printed in 1754, 
 " adopted the opinion of Tull ; and stated, that 
 " by finely dividing the soil, any number of 
 " crops might be raised in succession from the 
 " same land. He attempted also to prove by 
 " direct experiments, that vegetables of every 
 " kind, were capable of being raised without 
 
110 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 " manure. This celebrated horticulturist lived, 
 " however, sufficiently long to alter his opinion. 
 '* The results of his later and more refined ob- 
 * c servations led him to the conclusion, that no 
 " single material afforded the food of plants. 
 " The general experience of farmers had long 
 " before convinced the unprejudiced, of the truth 
 " of the same opinion, and that manures were 
 " absolutely consumed in the process of vegeta- 
 " tion. The exhaustion of soils by carrying off 
 " corn crops from them, and the effects of feed- 
 " ing cattle on lands, and of preserving their 
 " manures, offer familiar illustrations of the prin- 
 " ciple. And several philosophical enquirers, 
 " particularly Hazenfraz and Saussure, have 
 " shown by satisfactory experiments, that ani- 
 " mal and vegetable matters deposited in soils 
 " are absorbed by plants, and become a part of 
 " their organised matter. But though neither 
 " water, nor air, nor earth, supplies the whole of 
 " the food of plants, yet they all operate in the 
 " process of vegetation. The soil is the labora- 
 " tory in which the food is prepared. No ma- 
 " nure can be taken up by the roots of plants 
 "unless water is present j and water, or its 
 " elements, exist in all the products of vegeta- 
 " tion. The germination of seeds does not take 
 " place without the presence of air or oxygene 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. Ill 
 
 " gas. And in the sunshine, vegetables decom- 
 " pose the carbonic acid gas of the atmosphere ; 
 " the carbon of which is absorbed, and becomes 
 " a part of their organised matter. And the 
 " oxygene gas, the other constituent, is given 
 " off': and, in consequence of a variety of agen- 
 " cies, the economy of vegetation is made sub- 
 " servient to the general order of the system of 
 " nature. 
 
 " It is shown, by various researches, that the 
 " constitution of the atmosphere has been al- 
 " ways the same, since the time that it was 
 " first accurately analysed : and this must, in a 
 " great measure, depend upon the powers of 
 " plants to absorb, or decompose, the putrefying 
 " or decaying remains of animals and vegeta- 
 " bles, and the gaseous effluvia which they are 
 " constantly emitting. Carbonic acid gas is 
 " formed in a variety of processes of fermenta- 
 " tion and combustion, and in the respiration 
 " of animals, and as yet no other process is 
 " known in nature by which it can be consumed, 
 " except vegetation." 
 
 Thus it appears to be a general opinion, 
 among the chemical philosophers, that carbonic 
 acid gas forms a preponderating ingredient in 
 the constitution of the food of plants. And the 
 means of its formation and production are alike 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 described by all, but as to the manner, or through 
 what particular medium, it is supplied and con- 
 sumed, these authors vary in their opinions ; 
 and I cannot but think, Sir Humphry Davy 
 has taken a very mistaken view of this part of 
 his subject. To show that there are other means 
 in nature by which carbonic acid is consumed, 
 than by the leaves of plants, we need only take 
 his own description of the nature and proper- 
 ties of lime. On this part of the subject he 
 says, " Slacked lime was used by the Romans 
 " for manuring the soil in which fruit trees grew; 
 " this we are informed by Pliny. Marie had been 
 " employed by the Britons and the Gauls, from 
 " the earliest times, as a top dressing for land. 
 "But the precise period in which burnt lime first 
 " came into general use, in the cultivation of 
 " land, is, I believe, unknown : the origin of 
 " the application, from the early practices, is 
 " sufficiently obvious, A substance which had 
 " been used with success in gardening, must 
 " have been soon tried in farming ; and in coun- 
 " tries where marie was not to be found, cal- 
 " cined lime-stone would be naturally employed 
 " as a substitute." 
 
 " The elder writers on agriculture had no 
 " correct notion of the nature of lime, lime- 
 " stone, and marie, or of their effects, and this 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 " was the necessary consequence of the imper- 
 " fection of the chemistry of the age. Calca- 
 " reous matter was considered, by the alche- 
 " mists, as a peculiar earth, which in the fire 
 " became combined with inflammable acid ; and 
 " Evelyn and Hartlib, and still later, Lisle, in 
 " their works on husbandry, have characterised 
 " it merely as a hot manure, of use in cold 
 " lands. It is to Dr. Black of Edinburgh, that 
 " our first distinct rudiments of knowledge on 
 " the subject are owing. About the year 1755, 
 " this celebrated professor proved, by the most 
 " decisive experiments, that Jime-stone and all 
 " its modifications, marbles, chalks, and marles, 
 " consist principally of a peculiar earth united 
 " to an aerial acid ; that the acid is given out in 
 " burning, occasioning a loss of more than forty 
 "percent.; and that the lime in consequence 
 " becomes caustic. 
 
 " These important fa-cts, immediately applied 
 " with equal certainty to the explanation of the 
 " uses of lime, both as a cement, and as a 
 " manure. As a cement, lime, applied in its 
 " caustic state, acquires its hardness and dura- 
 " bility by absorbing the aerial (or, as it has 
 " been since called, the carbonic,) acid, which 
 " always exists in small quantities in the atmo- 
 " sphere; it becomes, asitwere, again lime-stone," 
 
 i 
 
114 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 Now admitting that carbonic acid is a neces- 
 sary part in composing the food of plants, it 
 appears to me that Mr. Kirwan's theory is by 
 far the most probable. He says, " That car- 
 " borne acid soon precipitates, by superiority of 
 " its specific gravity, and is then condensed in, 
 " or mechanically absorbed by, soils, or con- 
 " tained in dew." He also further remarks : 
 " That plants do not thrive, but most frequently 
 " perish, when surrounded by an atmosphere of 
 " fixed air, has long been observed by that 
 " great explorer of the most hidden processes 
 " of nature, Dr. Priestley ; but that fixed air, 
 " imbibed by the roots, is favourable to their 
 " growth, seems well established by the expe- 
 " riments of Dr. Perceval of Manchester, and 
 " fully confirmed by those of M. Ruskert. 
 " This last mentioned philosopher planted two 
 " beans in pots of equal dimensions, filled with 
 " garden mould ; the one was watered almost 
 " daily with distilled water, the other with water 
 " impregnated with fixed air, in the proportion 
 " of half a cubic inch to an ounce of water ; 
 " both were exposed to all the influence of the 
 " atmosphere, except rain ; the bean treated 
 " with aerated water, appeared overground nine 
 " days sooner than that moistened with distil- 
 " led water, and produced twenty-five beans; 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 115 
 
 " whereas the other pot produced only fifteen ; 
 " the same experiment was made with stock 
 " July flowers, and other plants, with equal 
 " success. The manner in which fixed air acts 
 " in promoting vegetation seems well explained 
 " by Senebier. He first discovered that fresh 
 " leaves exposed to the sun in spring water, or 
 " water slightly impregnated with fixed air, al- 
 " ways produced pure air, as long as this ira- 
 " pregnation lasts; but as soon as it is exhausted, 
 "or if the leaves be placed in water, out of 
 " which this air has been expelled by boiling, 
 " they no longer afford pure air ; from whence 
 " he infers, that fixed air is decomposed, its car- 
 " bonic principle detained by the plant, and its 
 " pure air is expelled ; it appears to me also, 
 " by acting as a stimulant, to help the decomposi- 
 " tion of the wafer." 
 
 Sir Humphry Davy again says, " When a 
 " growing plant, the roots of which are sup- 
 " plied with a proper nourishment, is exposed 
 " in the presence of solar light, to a given 
 " quantity of atmospheric air, containing its due 
 " proportion of carbonic acid, the carbonic 
 " acid, after a certain time, is destroyed, and a 
 " certain quantity of oxygene is formed in its 
 " place. If new quantities of carbonic acid gas 
 " be supplied, the same result occurs, so that 
 
 i 2 
 
116 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 " the carbon is added to plants from the air, by 
 " the process of vegetation in sunshine, and 
 " oxygene is added to the atmosphere." He 
 adds, " This circumstance is proved by a num- 
 " ber of experiments made by )rs. Priestley, 
 '' Ingenhouz, and Woodhouse, and M. T. de 
 " Saussure, many of which I have repeated 
 " with similar results. The absorption of car- 
 " bonic acid gas, and the production of oxygene y 
 " are performed by the leaf. And leaves re- 
 " cently separated from the tree, effect the 
 " change, when confined in portions of air con- 
 " taining carbonic acid, and produce oxygene, 
 " even when immersed in water holding carbo- 
 " nic acid in solution." 
 
 From what has been before said, on the nature 
 and properties of the leaves of plants, it is not 
 only pretty clear, that they are not furnished 
 with organs, necessary for the double action, 
 but it is in no respect necessary they should 
 possess this power. Why should a plant be en- 
 dowed with the power of feeding at both ends, 
 any more than animals, and when, like them, it 
 is proved, that the taking in their food at one, 
 is sufficient for all their purposes ? The expe- 
 riment cited, of carbonic acid being absorbed 
 by leaves recently severed from the tree, is no 
 eorroboration of Sir Humphry's theory, as if 
 
OX THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 117 
 
 does not appear, that the stems were sealed, 
 and therefore they were left with the power of 
 taking up the fluid through the usual and natural 
 channels. 
 
 Sir Humphry Davy again says, " Vegetable 
 " and animal substances deposited in the soil, as 
 " shown by universal experience, are consumed 
 " during the process of vegetation, and they can 
 " only nourish the plant by affording solid matter 
 " capable of being dissolved by the fluids in the 
 " leaves of vegetables : but such parts of them 
 " as are rendered gaseous, and that pass into the 
 " atmosphere, must possess a comparative small 
 " effect, for gases soon become diffused through 
 " the mass of the surrounding air." 
 
 " The great object in the application of ma- 
 " nures, should be to make it afford as much 
 " soluble matter as possible to the roots of the 
 " plant, and that in a slow and gradual manner, 
 " so that it may be entirely consumed in forming 
 " its sap and organised parts." 
 
 And again, " No substance is more necessary 
 " to plants than carbonaceous matter, and if this 
 " cannot be introduced into the organs of plants, 
 " except in a state of solution, there is every 
 "reason to suppose that other substances less 
 " essential will be in the same case. I found by 
 " some experiments made in 1804, that plants 
 
 i 3 
 
118 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 " introduced into strong solutions of sugar, mu- 
 " cilage, tanning principle, jelly, and other sub- 
 " stances, died ; but that plants lived in the same 
 " solutions, after they had fermented. At that 
 " time I supposed that fermentation was neces- 
 " sary to prepare the food of plants, but I have 
 " since found that the deleterious effects of the 
 " recent vegetable solutions were owing to their 
 " being too concentrated; in consequence of 
 " which, the vegetable organs w r ere wholly clog- 
 " ged with solid matter, and the transpiration of 
 " the leaves prevented. The beginning of June in 
 " the next year, I used solutions of the same 
 " substances, but so much diluted, that there was 
 " only about one two-hundredth part of solid ve- 
 " getable matter in the solutions. Plants of 
 " mint grew luxuriantly in all these solutions, 
 " but least so in that of astringent matter. I 
 " watered some spots of grass in a garden, with 
 " the different solutions of jelly, sugar, and mu- 
 " cilage, which grew most vigourously, and that 
 " watered with the solution of tanning principle, 
 " grew better than that watered with common 
 " water. 
 
 Again, " Mucilaginous, gelatinous, saccharine, 
 " oily, and extractive fluids, and solutions of 
 " carbonic acid in water, are substances that in 
 " their unchanged states contain almost all the 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 119 
 
 " principles necessary for the life of plants j but 
 " there are few cases in which they can be ap- 
 " plied as manures in their pure forms, and 
 " vegetable manures in general contain a great 
 " excess of fibrous and insoluble matter, which 
 " must undergo chemical changes before they 
 " become the food of plants." 
 
 I must confess I do not see the utility of Sir 
 H. Davy's expressing such an opinion. To say 
 the best of it, it appears, as Mr. Kirwan observes, 
 to be but a speculation ; and as he does not state 
 the few cases, it is worse than useless, inasmuch 
 as it is calculated to mislead, bewilder, and con- 
 fuse, and to shake the confidence of mere prac- 
 tical husbandmen in the general doctrines of 
 chemistry. 
 
 I cannot but think it by far the most probable, 
 that Sir Humphry Davy's first idea was the 
 correct one ; and that such substances must be 
 reduced by fermentation before they can be taken 
 up by the roots. At any rate, under those cir- 
 cumstances, the effect of such an application as 
 he describes, to the roots of the plants, must 
 have been the same, that is, death : but another 
 cause of death much more probable may be as- 
 signed, than that of the vessels being clogged 
 with solid matter; viz. the oxygenization, or 
 acidifying of those solutions, which most likely 
 
 i 4 
 
120 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 destroyed the roots. At any rate, whenever I 
 have found a plant wholly killed by the appli- 
 cation of fermenting substances, I have observed 
 the roots were first destroyed. I have no doubt 
 of the correctness of Mr. Kirwan's observation, 
 that " vegetables not only require food, but 
 " that food be duly administered to them, a sur- 
 " feit being as fatal to them as absolute privation." 
 But the effect of surfeit in plants, is generally 
 the same as with animals, and discovers itself by 
 disease affecting different parts, in the manner of 
 sores and putrefying wounds, which also, as with 
 animals, are often followed by mortification and 
 death. 
 
 If, as Mr. Kirwan states, the more solid part 
 of vegetables be submitted to dry distillation, 
 or burnt in a close vessel, it will be reduced to 
 charcoal ; and which will continue to occupy 
 almost as much space, as the vegetable itself did 
 previous to the change, and to retain the same 
 figure and the same organic disposition. It is 
 therefore very evident, that the basis of charcoal, 
 which is termed carbon, not only forms the grand 
 stamina of plants, but that it enters into the 
 composition of every part and produce of ve- 
 getables : it may hence be justly inferred, that 
 if the plant be formed by the required ele- 
 ments, taken in at the root, (and of which there 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 can be no doubt,) the basis of charcoal must, in 
 that part of the food of plants which is supplied 
 by artificial means, form almost an integral ; 
 and how to prepare, co^ct, and apply this sub- 
 stance, is the grand desideratum. 
 
 As Sir Humphry Davy says, mucilaginous, 
 gelatinous, saccharine, oily, and extractive fluids, 
 and solutions of carbonic acid in water, are sub- 
 stances that in their unchanged states contain 
 almost all the principles necessary for the life of 
 plants ; and all that is contained in these sub- 
 stances, except the basis of charcoal, is contained 
 in water ; viz. oxygene, nitrogene, and earth. 
 In the preparation of food for plants, therefore, 
 the principal object must be to produce and 
 apply carbon, and the manner of effecting this is 
 still an object of doubt, difficulty, and uncer- 
 tainty, which is evinced by the opinions even of 
 those great philosophers which I have quoted. 
 
 What Mr. Kirwan says respecting coal, is true 
 enough ; but as to coal in itself, being made to 
 form any part of the food of plants, I have never 
 seen it proved ; that it has been applied as manure 
 with good effect, may be, but its operation must 
 have been as an alterative in the soil, and a pre- 
 ventative of putrefaction, and not as affording 
 carbonaceous matter to the plant. The shavings 
 of wood, no doubt, might have been reduced 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 to charcoal, by the operation of fire, but would 
 they in this state have afforded as much of the 
 basis of charcoal in a soluble state, as by the result 
 of oxydizement or ferrtfmtation ? Certainly not : 
 then it may be inferred, that to furnish charcoal, 
 or a substance capable of being converted into 
 charcoal, is not enough. Carbon must be pre- 
 sented in that state which admits of its perfect 
 solution and combination with water. And even 
 after this is produced, it clearly appears that some 
 co-operating agent is necessary, either to release 
 it from the natural attachment of some other 
 principle or substance, which is obnoxious to 
 plants, or to stimulate the plant to receive it ; 
 for it is found that the black residuum of veget- 
 ables, spontaneously decomposed by putrefaction, 
 will not of itself sustain such plants as are objects 
 of cultivation in agriculture ; nor will simple 
 calcareous earths ; but these two substances 
 blended in due proportions, constitute the most 
 fertile soils. Hence, as is well known, black 
 soils, which are constituted wholly of vegetable 
 matter, are sterile, and that by the simple com- 
 bination of lime they are rendered fertile. Then 
 what is this principle of fertility ? this is an im- 
 portant question. 
 
 The most complete solution of carbon, or that 
 state which admits of the most perfect union 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 1 C 2S 
 
 with water, appears to be carbonic acid ; but as 
 it has not been proved, that in this state it is, by 
 any application, capable of producing anything 
 like the quantity of carbonaceous matter required 
 to sustain a plant in health and vigour, it may 
 justly be concluded that carbonic acid, like coal, 
 is, by its constitution, restricted in its operation. 
 That process of decomposition, therefore, which 
 can be conducted so as to produce the required 
 state of solution and separation, without its run- 
 ning into the excess of carbonic acid or charcoal, 
 must be the most efficient ; and the chemical 
 terms which best express this state, appear to 
 me to be vegetable and animal oxydes ; and my 
 opinion as to the best mode of producing and 
 applying this, I shall hereafter explain. 
 
 Sir Humphry Davy says, " There is no ques- 
 " tion on which more difference of opinion has 
 " existed, than that of the state in which ma- 
 " nure ought to be ploughed into the land ; 
 " whether recent, or when it has gone through 
 " the process of fermentation. And this ques- 
 " tion is still a subject of discussion; but whoever 
 " will refer to the simplest principles of che- 
 " mistry, cannot entertain a doubt on the subject. 
 
 " As soon as dung begins to decompose, it 
 " throws off its volatile parts, which are the 
 
ON THE POOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 " most valuable and most efficient. Dung 
 " which has fermented, so as to become a mere 
 " soft cohesive mass, has generally lost from one- 
 " third to one-half of its most useful constituent 
 " elements. It evidently should be applied as 
 " soon as fermentation begins, that it may exert 
 " its full action upon the plant, and lose none 
 " of its nutritive powers/' 
 
 Again, " All green succulent plants con- 
 " tain saccharine or mucilaginous matter, with 
 " woody fibre, and readily ferment. They can- 
 " not, therefore, if intended for manure, be used 
 " too soon after their death." 
 
 A reference to the principles of chemistry, most 
 certainly induces me to form conclusions very 
 different to Sir Humphry : in his explanations 
 of chemical principles, and their combinations, 
 no doubt he is clear and correct ; but many of 
 his applications of those principles, and his in- 
 ferences, appear to me to be superficial, hypo- 
 thetical, and fallacious : and this most probably 
 arises from a want of practical knowledge and 
 observation. His opinions seem to be grounded 
 on the belief, that in the production and appli- 
 cation of food for plants, quantity is the grand 
 desideratum. He appears to have no notion 
 that the health and condition of plants determine 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 their value ; or that vegetables are as much af- 
 fected by both the quality and the quantity of 
 food, as animals are, but such is the case. 
 
 That the state and condition of food when ad- 
 ministered to animals, determine its effects, is ge- 
 nerally understood : and it is precisely the case 
 with vegetables. Thus, whenever the nutritive 
 part of food is blended with a large portion of 
 filthy and impure matter, vegetables, like ani- 
 mals, become gross, bloated, and diseased. 
 
 Although, (as I have before observed when 
 speaking of the leaves of plants,) a rapid growth 
 and large surface may be produced, this is of little 
 value as food for animals ; it is aqueous, vapid, 
 obnoxious, and of little solid value ; and plants 
 in such a state, are, in another point of view, like 
 animals, they are sterile, and seldom produce 
 their seed or fruit in perfection. And, therefore, 
 notwithstanding a great part of that which con- 
 stitutes vegetable and animal matter, may be 
 thrown off in the process of fermentation, it is im- 
 portant to consider, what those parts are, before 
 we attempt to appreciate their value. May it 
 not be necessary to the health of vegetables, 
 that a certain part should be expelled ? And, 
 although a portion of the more valuable part 
 may be wasted in the process of fermentation : 
 
OK THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 may not the process render the remainder of 
 more avail and value, and thus create a profit 
 instead of a loss ? 
 
 It must be remembered, that the authority of 
 chemistry rests upon this axiom, that whatever 
 constitutes a body, or operates as an agent in its 
 construction, must be demonstrable on a chemi- 
 cal examination, both by analysis and synthesis. 
 Now it does not appear, by the different analysis 
 before explained, that any vegetable substance 
 contains nitrogene, except gum, which is the 
 produce of disease ; but, that all animal sub- 
 stances, in an undecomposed state, do contain 
 nitrogene. Therefore, with all due deference 
 to Sir Humphry Davy, as in a demonstration 
 by synthesis, or in the composition of vegetable, 
 from animal substances, nitrogene cannot be 
 considered as necessary, ought it not to be disen- 
 gaged and expelled from such substances as are 
 prepared for the food of plants ? And if so, as 
 nitrogene cannot be separated, by any other 
 means than fermentation, is it not necessary 
 that such decomposition should be effected pre- 
 vious to its application? or that the substances 
 be so placed, that the obnoxious gases be passed 
 freely off, and that the action of decomposition 
 may not affect the roots? It does not appear 
 
ON THE TOO!) OF PLANTS. 
 
 that plants throw off anything as excrementitious 
 but oxygene ; and consequently, if nitrogene is 
 taken in, it must be appropriated. This remark 
 also applies to the consumption of hydrogene. 
 If a plant be induced to consume an extra quan- 
 tity of hydrogene, or carburetted hydrogene, it 
 must form a surface sufficiently large to employ 
 or appropriate it, or it must be passed off as 
 diseased excresence ; it cannot be expelled in a 
 healthy manner, like oxygene. 
 
 Sir Humphry says, " In the writings of scien- 
 " tific agriculturists, a great mass of facts may 
 " be found in favour of the application of farm- 
 " yard dung in a recent state. Mr. Young, in 
 " an Essay on Manures, which I have already 
 " quoted, adduces a number of excellent autho- 
 " rities in support of the plan. Many who 
 " doubted have been lately convinced : and, 
 " perhaps, there is no subject of investigation, 
 " in which there is such a union of theoretical 
 " and practical evidence. I have myself, within 
 " the last ten years, witnessed a number of dis- 
 " tinct proofs on the subject. I shall content 
 " myself with quoting that which ought to have, 
 " and which I am sure will have, the greatest 
 " weight among agriculturists. Within the last 
 " seven years, Mr. Coke has entirely given up 
 
128 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 " the system formerly adopted on his farm, of 
 " applying fermented dung : and he informs me, 
 " that his crops have been since as good as they 
 " ever were, and that his manure goes nearly 
 "" twice as far." 
 
 This doctrine, in a general sense, and com- 
 pared with the old practice, agrees perfectly 
 with my observation and experience ; but Sir 
 Humphry does not state, whether the dung is 
 immediately ploughed in, by Mr. Coke, or suf- 
 fered to lie on the surface ; and the difference 
 between those two modes of application, will be 
 found to be very important, by every person who 
 will try them. 
 
 I shall hereafter state my reasons why it is 
 improper, as a general practice, to manure lands 
 that are intended for immediate seed crops ; but 
 there may be cases where the state of the soil, 
 rom extreme poverty and other circumstances, 
 require it ; and in those cases, 1 am convinced 
 that the best time and manner of supplying dung 
 for such crops is, by spreading it over the sur- 
 face after the seeds are sown : at first sight, 
 and according to Sir Humphry's notions, this 
 may appear to be a wasteful practice ; but it is 
 far otherwise : for, as Sir Humphry says, " Or- 
 " ganic substances, as soon as they are deprived 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 " of vitality, begin to pass through a series of 
 " changes, which ends in their complete destruc- 
 " tion, in the entire separation and dissipation 
 " of the parts. Animal matters are the soonest 
 " destroyed by the operation of air, heat, and 
 " LIGHT. Vegetable substances yield more slow- 
 " ly, but finally obey the same laws. The periods 
 " of the application of manures, from decom- 
 " posing animal and vegetable substances, de- 
 " pend upon the knowledge of these principles." 
 Now, notwithstanding the manner of applying 
 dung which I recommend, that of spreading it 
 over the surface, and there permitting it to re- 
 main, before it be ploughed in, twelve months or 
 more, is directly opposite to that recommended 
 by Sir Humphry, it will be found more com- 
 pletely accordant with the above principles, as 
 well as with those of Mr. Kirwan : for, by leav- 
 ing dung openly spread on the surface, it is 
 evident, that the influence of the air, the heat of 
 the sun, and light, will be the least controlled 
 or obstructed ; and, consequently, the decom- 
 position will be more rapid, regular, and con- 
 formable to the wants of the plants. Under such 
 circumstances, more carbonic acid may be ge- 
 nerated ; but as this elastic fluid is heavier than 
 the atmospheric air, it will fall on and penetrate 
 the open surface of the soil, and thus accord in 
 
130 
 
 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 effect with the experiments, cited by Mr. Kirwan, 
 of Dr. Priestley and M. Ruckett. And as to 
 any loss arising by the evolution of any other 
 gases, they are less likely to occur from dung 
 in this situation than when buried ; for carbu- 
 retted hydrogene gas is formed in the greatest 
 quantity during the putrefactive fermentation, 
 and when the substances are immersed in, or 
 glutted with, water, and excluded from the air 
 and light ; and in this state they most generally 
 are when buried : and this gas, possessing an 
 opposite quality to the carbonic acid gas, in be- 
 ing much lighter than the atmospheric air, will, 
 as it is formed, operate in a reverse manner to 
 the carbonic acid ; it will immediately, on being 
 liberated, penetrate the surface of the soil, mount 
 rapidly into the atmosphere, and pass off with 
 the wind, and be thus lost. And further, it is 
 well known that animal and vegetable substances 
 decomposed by the cold putrefactive fermenta- 
 tion under the earth, or at the bottoms of stag- 
 nant ponds, axe inert and inefficient ; at least, 
 until they are made to undergo some other che- 
 mical change, by calcination, oxydation, &c. ; 
 this is evinced by peats, bogs, &c. 
 
 We may likewise instance the effect of the ac- 
 cumulated animal substances decomposed under 
 the earth in burial grounds, which never exhibit 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 131 
 
 any comparatively extraordinary luxuriance of 
 vegetation. And, as a practical demonstration 
 that dung, when laid on or near the surface, and 
 repeatedly turned over and exposed to the ac- 
 tion of the atmosphere, is not very rapidly or 
 very effectually exhausted, I shall state a course 
 of operations which were carried on in a field of 
 about six acres,, within my immediate observation. 
 The soil of this field was a fine friable loam, 
 and of a black colour, but the surrounding 
 land, although of the same texture, was of a 
 foxy brown j this difference in the colour, no 
 doubt, was occasioned by the difference in cul- 
 tivation and manuring. The surrounding lands 
 had been treated in a careless, slovenly manner, 
 as a common farm ; whilst the field in question 
 was cultivated as a market-garden, cropped with 
 esculent vegetables, and manured at least once 
 in the year, for many years. At the period it 
 came under my notice the market-gardener had 
 died, and it fell into the hands of another per- 
 son, who having but seven years to run of a 
 lease, determined, as he said, to work it out ; 
 he therefore sowed it with white wheat for five 
 years following, without giving any manure. 
 The first year, it produced forty-eight bushels 
 per acre, and every year after, the crops declin- 
 ed three or four bushels per acre. The sixth 
 
 K 2 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 year, it was planted with potatoes without ma- 
 nure, and the crop averaged fourteen tons per 
 acre. The seventh year, it was sown again with 
 wheat, without manure, and it produced up- 
 wards of thirty-two bushels per acre. 
 
 And to show the beneficial effects of top- 
 dressing, I shall also state that about this time, I 
 took possession of a field of pasture land of about 
 twenty acres, a strong yellow or foxy clay ; it 
 lay on the side of a hill, and was very wet and 
 poachy, particularly during winter ; had been ge- 
 nerally cut for hay, although it seldom produced 
 more than three-fourths of a load per acre, and 
 this not until the end of July. I drained it by 
 cutting a ditch at the upper side, deep enough 
 to get below the stratum of clay, which in some 
 places was upwards of five feet, turning the 
 water down the sides, and gave it a top dress- 
 ing of scavenger's manure, the cleaning of the 
 town streets ; and the year after, it produced me 
 a load and a half per acre, in the middle of 
 June ; and a second crop, of three-fourths of a 
 load, the beginning of September ; and this it 
 continued to do, varying a little, more or less, 
 according only as the seasons were wet or dry. 
 
 And to shew the effect of dung buried deep ; 
 the following instance may be sufficiently strong. 
 I had noticed a field at Wickham in Kent, 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 133 
 
 which was laid down for a cherry orchard, and 
 planted with fine young healthy standard trees, 
 that for two years made a beautiful and luxu- 
 riant growth, and the third year, in the spring, 
 they threw out their shoots with equal luxu- 
 riance; but before summer, I observed to my 
 astonishment, they were all withered and dead. 
 Not being able to assign a cause for such an 
 unusual failure, I called on the proprietor, to 
 enquire how it happened ; he seemed perfectly 
 resigned to what he called his ill luck, in having 
 them struck with a blight ; however, perceiving 
 no reason why his trees should be blighted, 
 whilst his neighbours all around, should escape 
 uninjured, I enquired farther as to the nature 
 of the subsoil, &c, when he told me he had been 
 at great expense and trouble to prepare the soil, 
 by giving it a thick covering of rich stable dung, 
 and trenching it in, a spit and a half deep with 
 the spade. I observed the trees had thrown 
 out a profuse discharge of gum, and have no 
 doubt, that during the two first years, the roots 
 had not penetrated the dung, but on reaching 
 it the third year, they were poisoned; or so 
 glutted with such impure food, as to be thus 
 diseased and destroyed. 
 
 Whatever devastation may be committed by 
 the insect or fungus tribe, to trees or plants, 
 
 K 3 
 
134 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 I am convinced that by far the greatest 
 extent of injury, from what is placed to the 
 account of canker, mildew, &c. if correctly in- 
 vestigated, will prove to originate in the unwhole- 
 some supply, or impurity, of the food. 
 
 As to the objection, that by leaving dung on 
 the surface, a too rapid decomposition of the 
 manure, will be followed by a too rapid con- 
 sumption of food ; it may be said, " a man can- 
 not eat his cake and have it too.'* Let the crop 
 be suited to the manure, or the manure to the 
 crop, and as long as he gets its full value, he 
 will have little reason to complain of its coming 
 into his pocket too quick ; the sooner he gets 
 a profitable return for one dressing of dung, the 
 sooner he can afford another j and if a proper 
 course of crops be taken, he may go on a long 
 time, without feeling cause to complain that his 
 lands are too prolific, or too rich. 
 
 To be consistent, we must either stick to 
 chemical principles, or give them up. The 
 difference in the effect of the method I re- 
 commend, of applying manure on the surface, 
 and there to suffer it to remain the longest pe- 
 riod convenient; and that, by Sir H. Davy, 
 of burying it immediately ; may be determined 
 by the comparative formation and effect of the 
 two gases, carbonic acid, and carburetted hy- 
 drogen. If the former be, as stated, a principal 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 135 
 
 ingredient in the food of plants, and that by its 
 gravity it will penetrate into the soil, no method 
 more favorable for its generation and equal dis- 
 tribution can be devised, than by my mode of 
 application j and if carburetted hydrogen be 
 either an unwholesome food, or by its rapid 
 escape, the occasion of a great waste of carbon ; 
 and nitrogene gas be poisonous, or obnoxious, 
 when in contact with the food; no mode can 
 be more favorable to, or productive of, both 
 those effects, than burying the dung in an un- 
 fermented state. 
 
 If we were to suppose, that a difference in the 
 quality of the food supplied to plants, produced no 
 difference in its effects ; or that the roots possessed 
 the power of selecting the exact quantity and pro- 
 portion of each principle, required for its parti- 
 cular purpose, from any composition that may be 
 presented to it ; we should be driven far off from 
 accounting for the diseases of plants, or for the dif- 
 ference in the size, substance, state, and condi- 
 tion of plants of the same species, when growing 
 in the same situations : and, although we are 
 justified in believing, that a plant having taken 
 in its food in a compound state, possesses the 
 power of dividing and appropriating the different 
 parts to its different purposes, it must be pb- 
 vious, that any unnatural obstruction to the due 
 
 K 4 
 
136 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 exertion of those powers ; or any improper sub- 
 stance being taken into the system with the 
 food ; must be followed by disorder, disease, and 
 destruction. 
 
 One great power which plants are allowed 
 to possess, and which seems absolutely neces- 
 sary ; is the decomposition of water, and the 
 emission of oxygene ; for, from the proportion 
 of oxygene in water, being so much greater than 
 in any of the vegetable products, the plant must 
 take up more than it can need ; and the great 
 power and activity of oxygen is such, that un- 
 less plants had the means of expelling the super- 
 fluous quantity, they could not exist, nor could 
 the different products be formed. But plants do 
 not appear to possess the power of expelling hy- 
 drogene ; therefore, whatever quantity of this 
 substance be taken into the system, it must re- 
 main and be appropriated. With these ideas, the 
 following analysis will be found generally to ac- 
 cord: 
 
 Water contains, 85 parts oxygene, 
 
 15 - hydrogene. 
 
 Oil contains, 79 parts carbon, 
 
 21 - hydrogene. 
 
 Sugar contains, - 28 parts carbon, 
 
 8 - hydrogene, 
 
 64 v oxygene. 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 137 
 
 Gum contains, %3 parts carbon, 
 
 1 1 hydrogene, 
 
 65 oxygene, 
 
 1 nitrogene. 
 
 Starch contains, 43 parts carbon, 
 
 7 hydrogene, 
 
 50 oxygene. 
 
 Most people are aware, that the quality of the 
 food consumed by animals, is equally as deter- 
 mined in its effects, as the quantity, and such is 
 the case with vegetables. When an animal is 
 constrained to live on meagre, impure food, or 
 that, wherein a small quantity of nutriment is dif- 
 fused or blended with a large insipid mass, it is 
 induced to consume a greater quantity, to make 
 up for the want of a more concentrated quality ; 
 and the consequence is, an extension of the 
 stomach and bowels. But although the animal in 
 this condition, appears large in bulk, it possesses 
 little solid value, and less strength to bear up 
 under the additional weight; and such is the 
 case with vegetables ; their stalks, branches, and 
 leaves, are the organs for the reception and di- 
 gestion of the food ; and whenever they are 
 glutted with meagre food, a large extension of 
 the leaf and branches follows, but in this state 
 these possess little substance or value. 
 
 That some plants are more voracious than 
 
138 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 others, and that they sometimes, like some 
 animals, feed on gross impurities j is distinctly 
 proved by the flavor of esculents, and parti- 
 cularly the cabbage tribe : thus we find that 
 sea-kale, growing in rank manured beds, is so 
 gross and bitter in flavour, as scarcely to be 
 eatable; whilst that which is grown in a pure 
 natural soil, is sweet and delicious. 
 
 Certainly, we cannot pretend to the powers of 
 determining and measuring out the exact pro- 
 portions of the required elements ; but we may, 
 by a little attention, be able to counteract and 
 avoid extremes. 
 
 It appears throughout nature, that the efforts 
 of a plant, from its first establishment, is directed 
 to acquire the proper state and condition to 
 propagate its species ; and that in its seeds and 
 fruit is comprised its concentrated essence. We 
 may therefore estimate its powers and efforts to be 
 in proportion to its wants ; and hence we may sup- 
 pose, that as starch, and sugar, contain a large 
 portion of oxygene, and a small portion of hy- 
 drogene; that those plants whose desired pro- 
 ducts consist of such substances, should be sup- 
 plied with food containing a large portion of 
 carbon and oxygene ; and as oil contains a large 
 proportion of hydrogene, and no oxygene ; that 
 to those vegetables, whose seeds produce oil, a 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 139 
 
 supply of food should be given, containing a 
 large portion of hydrogene and carbon. 
 
 On these grounds, admitting carbonic acid 
 and carburetted hydrogene to form the food of 
 plants, we come to the following conclusions. 
 Those substances, and that mode of preparation, 
 which produce carbonic acid, and carbonaceous 
 oxydes, constitute the best food, and the best 
 state, for all plants producing grain and pulse ; 
 and surpass also, the best adapted for clovers, 
 grasses, &c., for feed and for hay ; as the quantity 
 of saccharine matter they contain, determines 
 their value, arid riot the bulk, which alone would 
 be increased by carburetted hydrogene. For 
 those plants whose seeds produce oil, such as 
 hemp, flax, rape, and all the cabbage tribe, car- 
 buretted hydrogene may be Well adapted. We 
 find those ideas corroborated by natural and 
 practical results : thus, seed-crops of grain and 
 pulse are always most healthy and prolific, on 
 lands that have been treated in that manner, 
 and left in that state, in which the roots are the 
 most completely freed from those substances 
 which produce carburetted hydrogene gas ; and 
 hemp, rape, turnips, cabbages, &c., from their 
 peculiar form of growth, are enabled to sustain 
 a large and extended surface, and can therefore 
 
140 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 appropriate a large portion of carburetted hy- 
 drogene without injury. 
 
 A due attention to these particulars will ex- 
 plain the want of accordance in the opinions of 
 Sir Humphry Davy, with many of the operations 
 that are most successfully practised by many 
 eminent farmers. Indeed, if the food of plants 
 was wasted, by exposure to the atmosphere ; 
 ploughing and stirring up the soil must occasion 
 waste and sterility ; and the same must be the 
 case with turning over, and exposing masses of 
 dung; but, observing practitioners well know 
 that those processes are followed by additional 
 prolificacy. 
 
 That class, among the cultivators of plants, 
 who, of all others, pay the most attention to their 
 health, and proper condition for fructification, 
 is, perhaps, the florists ; and the most eminent 
 amongst those, make it their practice to mix and 
 turn over their compost at short intervals, so 
 that every part may be exposed to the influence 
 of the sun, air, and light, for at least twelve 
 months before they use it. 
 
 The fact is, I believe, that whether carbon 
 and oxygene combined, as carbonic acid, be the 
 best state of preparation for the consumption 
 of plants, or not ; carbon and oxygene form the 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 141 
 
 grand essentials for making them prolific ; and 
 when vegetable aud animal substances are laid 
 on the surface of the soil they are intended to 
 enrich, they are in a situation best calculated 
 for decomposition, by oxydizement ; for then, 
 as they are reduced to a soluble state, they are 
 dissolved by water, and carried to the roots ; 
 and when there is not moisture enough to carry 
 down the soluble part, it lies dry on the surface ; 
 and whilst dry, as Sir H. Davy observes, 
 no fermentation can take place ; and thus 
 circumstanced, under the alternate state of wet 
 and dry, the decomposition is gradual, complete, 
 and rapid. This may be observed by a stake of 
 wood, that has been some time fixed into the 
 earth ; for that part which is under the earth, and 
 that which is in the air, will remain sound, long 
 after that part which is between both, or on a 
 level with the surface of the earth, is completely 
 decomposed. 
 
 Besides, there is a natural operation constantly 
 working, to assist in the decomposition of vege- 
 table substances which are laid on the surface, 
 and to facilitate their conveyance to the roots of 
 plants ; which, although little thought of) is of 
 great importance, and this is conducted by the 
 earth worms. Whoever will notice the surface of 
 the earth, will find those creatures not only con- 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 stantly boring holes, and drawing the light sub- 
 stances around them, but that by their slime 
 they very much quicken the decomposition; this 
 is readily proved by leaving a piece of twine 
 on the surface of the earth a short time ; and 
 within a few days after it has been laid hold of 
 by the worms, it will be found quite rotten ; 
 their holes also afford ready channels of convey- 
 ance for the decomposed matter. 
 
 And further, these little creatures perform 
 another important operation ; they devour and 
 cast upon the surface, the more finely divided 
 earthy substances and undecomposed matter; 
 and thus that part of the soil best adapted to 
 sustain vegetation, is collected and accumulated 
 on the surface, and within the healthful range 
 of the roots of plants. The soil is also by such 
 means, rendered more conducive to an equal 
 percolation and evaporation of water ; and it 
 may be observed, that placing dung on the sur- 
 face, favours both the existence and the working 
 of these useful cultivators ; the surface of the 
 earth, thus continually opened, also affords a free 
 ingress to the carbonic acid gas, and egress to 
 the carburetted hydrogene. 
 
 Again, Sir Humphry says, " All green suc- 
 " culent plants contain saccharine, or mucilagi- 
 " -nous matter, with woody fibre, and readily 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 143 
 
 " ferment ; they cannot, therefore, if intended 
 " for manure, be used too soon after their 
 " death." 
 
 " When green crops are to be employed for 
 " enriching a soil, they should be ploughed in, 
 " if possible, when in flower, or at the time the 
 " flower is beginning to appear ; for it is at this 
 " period that they contain the largest quantity 
 " of easily soluble matter, and that their leaves 
 " are most active in forming nutritive matter ; 
 " green crops, pond weeds, the paring of hedges 
 " or ditches, or any kind of fresh vegetable 
 " matter, requires no preparation to fit them for 
 " manure ; the decomposition slowly proceeds 
 " beneath the soil ; the soluble matters are gra- 
 " dually dissolved, and the slight fermentation 
 " that goes on, checked by the want of a free 
 " communication of air, tends to render the woody 
 " fibre soluble, without occasioning the rapid 
 " dissipation of elastic matter." 
 
 This doctrine is evidently founded on the 
 notion, that plants consume vegetable substances 
 in their compound state ; but having admitted 
 that carbon, oxygene, and hydrogene, with a 
 portion of earth, are all the elements that are 
 necessary to compose a vegetable ; and also, that 
 water contains all those elements in itself, ex- 
 cept carbon, and that carbon, produced by the 
 
144 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 fermentation of vegetables, is readily dissolved 
 and taken up by water ; and that plants possess 
 the power of decomposing water, and of divid- 
 ing and appropriating its principles, in com- 
 bination with carbon, to all its various uses ; why 
 are those principles abandoned, and a process 
 recommended, grounded upon supposition only, 
 in preference ? Such a deviation from the wise 
 rule of Sir Isaac Newton is surely worse than tri- 
 fling ; it is injurious to the character of science. 
 
 Vegetables exposed to the sun and air, and 
 dried, are found to possess more or less of sugar, 
 according to their nature ; and sugar is a vege- 
 table oxyde, almost immediately soluble and 
 convertible into food ; and it is most readily 
 convertible and productive of carbonic acid ; 
 let any person take a bundle of hay, and a bun- 
 dle of green grass, and submit each to infusion, 
 and compare the extract, both in appearance 
 and effect ; the difference will be considerable. 
 
 What says Sir Humphry of malt dust ? That 
 it " consists chiefly of the infant radical, se- 
 " parated from the grain." And he says, " I 
 " have never made any experiment upon this 
 " manure, but there is great reason to suppose 
 " it must contain saccharine matter, and this will 
 " account FOR ITS POWERFUL EFFECTS." Now if 
 these infant radicals had been separated and 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 115 
 
 buried in their green state,- what powerful effects 
 could they have been expected to have produced 
 in fertilising the soil, more than the severed ra- 
 dicals of other plants, of which the earth is 
 always full ? Surely none. Then what created 
 the difference ? Most evidently the exposure 
 to heat and air on the kiln, which, by oxydise- 
 ment, created the sugar. 
 
 Vegetable substances and dung, in drying, un- 
 doubtedly are reduced in weight, by the eva- 
 poration of its water; but this is a loss of no 
 importance, for water is again readily supplied, 
 and by the operation they absorb oxygene, and 
 are thus brought to a state much more efficient ; 
 that of soluble oxydes. From all the observ- 
 ations I have made, and which I have endea- 
 voured to explain, I am convinced, that every 
 addition of food to plants, and every operation 
 of agriculture, wherein the cultivation of vege- 
 tables is concerned ; will be found more or less 
 efficacious as it favours the free access, or in- 
 gress and egress, and the general influence, of 
 the oxygene of the atmosphere and water, to the 
 whole structure of the plant, and the ingredients 
 of its food during preparation. 
 
 And as to the mechanical effect of dung, in 
 pulverising the soil ; that which is placed on the 
 surface, must ultimately be equal to thai which 
 
146 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 is immediately buried ; for, as has been stated, 
 that by burning, the solid part of the earth can- 
 not be reduced ; no more can the solid part of 
 dung be reduced by evaporation ; and the effects 
 of dung thus placed, in increasing the disposi- 
 tion of a soil to absorb moisture from the at- 
 mosphere, cannot be less, than when immedi- 
 ately buried : and what is more essential, it will 
 be less retentive of water. 
 
 Sir Humphry Davy has fully and minutely 
 described the nature and properties of all the 
 different substances used as manures, and such 
 who wish for particular information on these 
 divided subjects, I must refer to his work. My 
 object being to establish general principles, it 
 would be superfluous to attempt following him 
 further. On the preservation of manure he 
 says, " When dung is to be preserved for any 
 " time, the situation in which it is kept is of 
 " importance; it should, if possible, be defended 
 " from the sun ; to preserve it under sheds 
 " would be of great use, or to make the site of 
 " a dunghill on the north side of a wall. The 
 " floor on which the dung is heaped should, if 
 " possible, be paved with flat stones, and there 
 " should be a little inclination from each side 
 -" towards the centre, in which there should be 
 " drains connected with a small well, furnished 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 ** with a pump, by which any fluid matter may 
 " be collected for the use of the land. It too 
 ** often happens that a dense mucilaginous and 
 " extractive fluid is suffered to drain away from 
 " the dunghill, so as to be entirely lost to the 
 farm." 
 
 My previous objections to the application of 
 Sir Humphry's ideas, must be equally strong 
 against the mode here recommended. 
 
 Those who are in the habit of making hot- 
 beds for vegetables, know that fresh dung from 
 the stable, packed together without a sufficient 
 degree of moisture, to modify its fermentation ; 
 will very speedily acquire a high degree of 
 heat, and throw off* a quantity of elastic vapour ; 
 either carburetted hydrogene, or ammonia, and 
 that as the moisture declines, the heat will also : 
 and the dung will then be overrun with moul- 
 diness, or fungii, and thus during such ferment- 
 ation, the exclusion of moisture or rain, by 
 a shed being placed over it, must facilitate and 
 increase the loss by such evaporation, and by the 
 evolution of the gases ; and the earth covering 
 dung in this state, will not afterwards support 
 vegetation. As the chief supply of manure is 
 derived from the stable and farm yard, the ar- 
 rangement and management of these is a matter 
 of no trivial importance. 
 
148 ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 In the general mode, I have always thought 
 sufficient care and attention are not given ta 
 the preservation and application of the urine of 
 the animals ; and that this is more valuable in 
 the composition of the food of plants, than is 
 generally calculated: urine not only in itself 
 contains greater fertilising powers than the 
 excrement, or dung ; but added to this, it consi- 
 derably accelerates and moderates the ferment- 
 ation, and particularly when diluted with water 
 in a due degree. The effects of the urine, also, 
 when thus divided and diluted, by mixing with 
 the dung, are much increased and beneficially 
 extended : and a much better mode, in my opi- 
 nion, for conducting this process, than that 
 recommended by Sir Humphry, is described by 
 Sir John Sinclair, as adopted in the Netherlands. 
 
 He says, " The more opulent pave and .line 
 " with brick the receptacles for their dung, 
 " which is thus constantly kept plunged in a 
 " mass of liquid matter ; the fibrous parts of 
 " the vegetables are thus completely decom- 
 " posed, and four tons of this manure go as far 
 " as five kept with less precaution." 
 
 But this liquid should consist of urine not too 
 much diluted, or with no more water added, 
 than is sufficient to keep the fermenting heat 
 below the power of generating steam. 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 149 
 
 Drains should be carefully made from the 
 stables and cattle-sheds, to cisterns or wells 
 protected from the rains ; and from these, the 
 urine should be taken and thrown over the 
 dung-heap, which should be open to the air ; 
 there is little danger of too much water added 
 by the rains, if not under the dripping of a shed. 
 
 I am convinced that stable and yard dung, 
 saturated with urine, and preserved in this man- 
 ner, would go twice as far as such dung pre- 
 pared in the usual manner, that is, by being 
 thrown into the open yard, and where the urine 
 of the stables and sheds is not only suffered to 
 run away, but the yard laid in such a manner 
 that the dung is washed by the rains, and the 
 drainings wasted. 
 
 It is a little singular that landlords, well aware 
 that on the supply of manure depends the value 
 of the farm ; are in many instances so jealous 
 of having all the produce of the farm spent on 
 its land, that they will not permit their te- 
 nants to sell a load of straw ; and yet they not 
 only will not be at the expense of properly 
 constructed receptacles for preserving the ma- 
 nure, themselves ; but will not regard the care- 
 less ignorance and neglect of the tenant, of 
 these objects. 
 
 The superior effect of putting the manure on 
 L 3 
 
150 ON THE FOOD* O$' PLANTS* 
 
 the land as it is produced, as stated by Sir Ku 
 Davy to be the case with Mr. Coke, may be 
 accounted for, as arising from the urine absorbed 
 by the litter, which, if left in the usual way, 
 spread in an open yard, would have been wasted 
 and lost.* 
 
 * Whilst recommending the careful and effectual drain- 
 ing of stables, for the preservation of the urine, as the most 
 valuable part of animal manure, I will also state a circum- 
 stance, which cannot be thought unworthy of notice to 
 agriculturists, which occurred to me, to show how neces- 
 sary this is also to the health of animals. 
 
 I took possession of some stables, with the horses that 
 had been some time kept in them, and, to my misfortune, 
 in a very short time I found that the horses kept in those 
 stables had been subject to that dreadful disease, called 
 the mad staggers, for several years. Some horses had 
 died, and the horses then there, and which had been for 
 some time kept in the stables, were in wretched condition. 
 Two fine fresh horses which were put into them, were 
 within a few months seized with the mad staggers, and 
 one of them literally killed himself by knocking his head 
 about against the manger and stall ; the other was 
 saved by copious bleeding, and removal into a fresh stable, 
 but was so reduced as to be lessened in value one- 
 half. My neighbours advised the pulling down the stables, 
 considering the disease infectious ; but having, on going into 
 the stables early in the morning, been almost suffocated 
 and blinded by obnoxious gas ; I examined the floor and 
 drains, when I found the former to consist of large burr 
 stones, laid on a stiff clay ; and the floor sunk so low below 
 the drain, as not to admit of the draining away of the urine, 
 This struck me to be a sufficient cause to affect the brain oi 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 151 
 
 To show the fertilising effects of urine, Sir 
 John Sinclair says, " Every sort of urine con- 
 " tains the essential elements of vegetables in a 
 "state of solution. The urine of a horse, being 
 " so much lighter, would be more valuable than 
 " its dung, if both must be conveyed to any dis- 
 " tance. The urine of six cows, or horses, wilt 
 " enrich a quantity of earth, sufficient to top- 
 " dress one English acre of grass land j and as 
 " it would require four pounds worth of dung 
 " to perform the same operation, the urine of a 
 " cow, or horse, is worth about twelve shil- 
 " lings per annum, allowing eight shillings 
 " per acre as the expense of preparing the 
 " compost. The advantages of irrigating grass 
 " lands with cow urine almost exceeds belief. 
 " Mr. Harley, of Glasgow, (who keeps a large 
 " dairy in that town,) by using cow urine, cuts 
 " some small fields of grass six times ; and the 
 " average of each cutting is fifteen inches in 
 " length." 
 
 In concluding this part of my subject, I shall 
 shortly recapitulate my observations. 
 
 any animal confined in it, the same as it had the horses. 1 
 therefore had the floor taken up, relaid, and properly drained; 
 and the walls and ceiling, manger, cribs, &c, washed with 
 quick lime ; and from that time for ten years, I never had a 
 diseased horse. 
 
 L 4 
 
ON. THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 It seems to be generally admitted, that animal 
 and vegetable matter must be reduced to a per- 
 fectly soluble state, before it can be appropri- 
 ated as food for plants ; and to effect this, it is 
 considered necessary, that a perfect decompo- 
 sition should take place, of the substances pro- 
 vided for this purpose, and many processes are 
 noticed, by which a decomposition is effected ; 
 but that which is most generally considered as 
 the indispensable one, is the putrefactive fer- 
 mentation. There are, however, five distinct 
 stages of fermentation described by chemists ; 
 namely, the saccharine, or that which changes 
 coagulated mucus, or starch, into sugar; the vi- 
 nous, or that which forms alcohol, or spirit, from 
 sugar, and at the same time generates carbonic 
 acid ; the acetous, or that which forms vinegar 
 from sugar ; the colouring, or that which con- 
 verts the substance of the green indigo plant 
 into blue ; and the putrefactive, which effects 
 the last and complete disunion of all the com- 
 ponent parts of a body ; leaving all at liberty to 
 form other combinations. 
 
 Now all the different authors appear to concur 
 in the opinion, that the putrefactive ferment- 
 ation is a necessary process for the reduction of 
 animal and vegetable substances, to the requisite 
 state of food for plants 5 the other different stages 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 153 
 
 being either overlooked, or considered unim- 
 portant : but in this, I think, they egregiously 
 err. 
 
 It is certain, that when animal and vegetable 
 substances are left to spontaneous decay, the 
 putrefactive fermentation must be the ultimate 
 result; but it is demonstrative, that the resi- 
 duum, or the matter left by completely putrefied 
 animal and vegetable substances ; will not sup- 
 port the vegetables cultivated by man, in a 
 healthful progress to prolificacy, any more than 
 either of the simple earths : and that when 
 reduced to this state, its action is merely me- 
 chanical, or operative only, as it serves to temper, 
 or constitute, the compost or soil. And further, 
 that when in too great a proportion, in this state, 
 it is injurious, as it retains water until it becomes 
 in a state of stagnation ; whilst, on the contrary, 
 every process that checks the putrefactive fer- 
 mentation, and every operation that retards and 
 dispels its effects, in and on the soil ; and the 
 addition of many substances that are decidedly 
 anti-putrescent, such as charcoal, alkaline salts, 
 lime, &c. and which facilitate the dispersion of 
 water : add to the fertility of the soil, and in- 
 crease its prolificacy. 
 
 Thus we find that the spreading of dung 
 thinly over, and near, the surface of the earth ; 
 
ON THE FOOD OF PLAtNTS. 
 
 the repeatedly stirring and turning it up, and 
 exposing it to the action of the sun, light, and 
 air ; paring and burning ; the addition of lime, 
 and the calcareous and saline substances ; and, 
 above all, the production, presence, and reten- 
 tion of carbonic acid ; all corroborate my prin- 
 ciples. 
 
 And if all physiologists do not agree, that car- 
 bonic acid forms the productive food of plants ; 
 all accord in the doctrine, that those substances 
 which either contain, or are capable of pro- 
 ducing carbonic acid : are conducive to the fer- 
 tility of the soil, and congenial to the health and 
 fructification of plants. I therefore cannot but 
 think the following are the true inferences; that 
 in the decomposition of vegetables and animals, 
 or the preparation of the food of plants ; (so far 
 from hastening,) every means should be adopted 
 that anticipate, or precede, the putrefactive fer- 
 mentation, in the reduction of those substances 
 to a soluble state ; that vegetable substances 
 should be managed and disposed, so as to effect 
 and encourage the saccharine fermentation to the 
 utmost ; before they are exposed to the putrefac- 
 tive, which is done by effectually drying them in 
 the sun and air ; and that animal substances 
 should, as much as possible, be placed under those 
 circumstances which favour the formation and 
 
-ON trifi FOOD OF PLANTS. 
 
 diffusion of nitrous salts, and that prevent the 
 formation of carburetted hydrogen ; and this is 
 done by mixing them with vegetable substances 
 and calcareous earths, lime, &c. and exposing 
 them, as much as possible, to the action of the 
 air and light. And, above all, that every means 
 be adopted to remove every tendency in the soil, 
 or the manure, to retain water in a state of stag- 
 nation; for those plants which are the grand 
 objects of cultivation in husbandry, will never 
 grow healthy and prolific in stagnant water; 
 whatever food they may be supplied with ; nor 
 will the residuum of animal or vegetable matter, 
 decomposed by putrefaction in stagnant water, 
 either invigorate or sustain such vegetables- 
 
166 
 
 ON THE RUST OR BLACK BLIGHT IN WHEAT. 
 
 ACCORDING to our understanding of the prin- 
 ciples, which regulate and determine the prepara- 
 tion and application of the food of plants ; must 
 be our notions of the diseases of plants, and our 
 ideas of the best mode or course of cultivating 
 them. 
 
 A wide difference undoubtedly exists in the for- 
 mation, functions, and peculiar nature of animals 
 and vegetables; but yet they may, in many res- 
 pects, be assimilated ; and thus, by comparison, 
 the proper treatment of plants be simplified, and 
 rendered more easy of explanation and comprehen- 
 sion. I shall take leave to state, that the observa- 
 tion and experience of many years have convinced 
 me, that the opinions of the great reformer of the 
 medical profession, Mr. Abernethy that the most 
 afflicting diseases to which the human species 
 are subjected, are generated in the stomach, and 
 consequently are to be remedied by the stomach 
 are perfectly just and well founded : and I am 
 also convinced, that most of the diseases of ani- 
 mals and of plants, may be accounted for and 
 remedied, on the same principles. From what 
 has been said, it is clear, that vegetables cannot 
 
ON THE RUST, &C. IN WHEAT. 157 
 
 be supported without a due supply of food ; and 
 that with those, as with animals, the quality and 
 quantity of food must possess an equal influence. 
 
 Every man is aware, that the quality of the 
 food he consumes, is equally as determined in its 
 effects, as the quantity ; and such, no doubt, is 
 the case with plants, as before observed. When 
 an animal is constrained to live on meagre, im- 
 pure food, it is induced to consume a greater quan- 
 tity, to make up as much as possible for the 
 deficiency of quality ; and the consequence is, a 
 distension of the stomach and bowels. And this 
 is often followed by a poverty and corruption of 
 the fluids, which produces disease and debility ; 
 and the body is wasted by eruptions, and becomes 
 a prey to vermin. And when an animal (more par- 
 ticularly during parturition) is glutted with gross 
 and rich food, a surfeit is the consequence ; and it 
 is subjected to a stagnation of the fluids, inflam- 
 mations, and eruptions; which often end in mor- 
 tification and death : and plants, under the same 
 circumstances, are subject to the same conse- 
 quences. 
 
 These observations will be found correctly to 
 apply to, and to afford a clear exemplification of, 
 the rust, or black blight, in wheat. 
 
 On this subject, Sir John Sinclair says, " It 
 " appears, from an able paper written "by a dis- 
 
158 ON THE RUST OR 
 
 " tinguished naturalist (Sir Jos. Banks), that this 
 " disease is occasioned by the growth of minute 
 " parasitical fungus, or mushrooms, on the leaves, 
 " stems, and glumes, or chaff, of the living 
 " plants ; and that the roots of the fungus, inter- 
 " cepting the sap intended by nature for the 
 " nutriment of the grain, render the grain lean 
 " and shrivelled, and, in some cases, rob it com- 
 " pletely of its flour. Nor is that all ; the straw 
 " becomes black and rotten, unfit for fodder, or 
 " little better than a caput mortuum, possessing 
 " neither strength or substance." 
 
 Again, " Several of the accidents, above 
 " enumerated, may contribute to the production 
 " of rust ; but there are two additional circum- 
 " stances which likewise tend to promote it. 
 " First, Having the land in too rich a state for 
 " corn crops ; and, Secondly, When too fre- 
 " quent a repetition of crops of wheat takes 
 " place." 
 
 " It has been well observed, that when crops, 
 " intended to ripen their seed, are objects of 
 " Culture, there is not only wanted a degree of 
 " vigour and luxuriance in the plants sufficient 
 " for the pin*pose ; but if the fertility of the soil 
 " be raised to a higher pitch than is necessary or 
 " consistent with that object, injurious rather 
 " than beneficial consequences may be the result. 
 
BLACK BLIGHT IN WHEAT. 159 
 
 " Land may be too rich for corn crops ; and it is 
 " better to keep it in a well-balanced condition, 
 " or in a medium state of productiveness, than 
 " in too fertile a state. The greater quantity of 
 " sap and juices in vegetables, growing on highly 
 " cultivated lands, it is evident, must necessarily 
 " render them more susceptible of the effects of 
 " sudden and extreme changes, and, conse- 
 " quently, more liable to disease. Besides, as 
 " mushrooms are produced on beds of dung, 
 " great quantities of manure must promote the 
 " growth of fungi, or parasitical plants, on the 
 " crops of wheat, if they are once infected. The 
 " wheat produced on the site of a dunghill is 
 " always rusted, even in the most favourable 
 " seasons ; and if the whole field is a species of 
 " dunghill, how can it escape ?" 
 
 " A too frequent repetition of crops of wheat, 
 " more especially when accompanied by great 
 " quantities of manure to force a crop, will often 
 " have the same effect. The rust was but little 
 " known in the western or the northern parts of 
 " England, or the southern counties of Scotland, 
 " until of late years, when every exertion has 
 " been made to increase the quantity of that 
 " grain." 
 
 Sir John Sinclair also says, "Among the reme- 
 " dies likely to diminish the effects of this fatal 
 
160 ON THK RUST OR 
 
 " malady, the following have been particularly 
 "recommended: 1. Cultivating hardy sorts of 
 " wheat ; 2. Early sowing ; 3. Raising early 
 " varieties ; 4. Thick sowing ; 5. Changes of 
 " seed ; 6. Consolidating the soil after sowing ; 
 " 7 Using saline manures ; 8. Improving the 
 " course of crops ; 9. Extirpating all plants that 
 " are receptacles of rust ; and, 10. Protecting 
 " the ears and roots of wheat, by rye, tares, and 
 " other crops." 
 
 And again, he says, " It is likewise stated on the 
 " respectable authority of an eminent naturalist 
 " (T. A. Knight, Esq.), that by crossing different 
 " varieties of wheat, a new sort MAY be produced, 
 " which will completely escape being rusted, 
 " though the crops in the neighbourhood, and in 
 " almost every district in the kingdom, may suffer 
 " from it in the same year. These circumstances 
 " tend to prove, that the rust does not depend 
 " solely on atmospheric influence, otherwise it 
 " could not be prevented by changes of seed, or 
 " by the crossing of different varieties." 
 
 This theory of Mr. Knight's is like many 
 others of his, grounded on a superficial view of 
 things, and is a mere fallacious hypothesis. 
 
 Indeed all these great naturalists appear to. 
 have bewildered themselves in specious theory ; 
 and from not 'having traced the operations of 
 
BLACK BLIGHT IN WHEAT. 161 
 
 nature to its source, have throughout mistaken 
 the effect for the cause. 
 
 Suppose a farmer was to find a sheep, unhappily 
 reduced, and preyed upon by maggots, or the 
 larva of the flesh-fly, he may very justly suppose 
 that the maggots reduced the sheep ; and as 
 justly expect, that whatever sheep were subjected 
 to the maggots, would be reduced in the same 
 manner. Then what would be the best and pro- 
 per remedy ? Knowing the maggots to be pro- 
 duced from eggs deposited by flies, would he try to 
 cover his sheep from the flies ; or attempt to drive 
 them where there were no flies ? Where is the 
 farmer or shepherd that does not know, that flesh- 
 flies will not deposit their eggs on a healthy part 
 of a sheep ; or if they do, that they will not pro* 
 duce maggots ? They know full well, that if a 
 sheep be diseased by eruptions, or wounded ; the 
 flies will find out these places, and there deposit 
 their eggs ; and, therefore, the remedy is simple : 
 cure and prevent the disease, or protect the 
 wounds, and the evil is avoided " Remove 
 " the cause and the effect ceases." 
 
 Very similar will be found the diseases in 
 wheat, called the rust, or black blight, and its 
 cause. 
 
 The fungus undoubtedly preys upon that 
 which is intended to nourish and sustain the 
 
 M 
 
162 ON THE RUST OR 
 
 wheat ; but what afforded an attraction and 
 lodgement for the fungus ? This is the grand 
 question. 
 
 It is stated, that the fungus is a parasitical 
 plant, like the misletoe, but this is not the fact ; 
 the fungus has no power to attach itself to, or 
 penetrate, the healthy stalks of the wheat, any 
 more than the larva of the flesh-fly have, the 
 healthy skin of the sheep. 
 
 Any one who will examine the stalks of wheat 
 growing on a luxuriant, rank soil, at short inter- 
 vals, about the time of its first showing the swelling 
 of the ear; will perceive the vessels to become rup- 
 tured, either from the luxuriant flow of the sap 
 up the tender tops of the plants, being checked 
 by cold winds, or an unhealthy overfulness, or 
 some other casual obstruction ; and the sap being 
 thus suddenly checked, will rupture the vessels, 
 and ooze out through little slits, or longitudinal 
 fissures ; the discharged matter will soon assume 
 the appearance of a white jelly ; as it dries, it will 
 become yellow, and then brown, and of a hard 
 texture : and in proportion as the sap-vessels are 
 injured and destroyed, and this exudation takes 
 place, the plant must of course, more or less, fail 
 in its supply of nourishment to the grain. In 
 some cases, the strongest stalks will not be able 
 to push the ear beyond the leaf, and the coro 
 
BLACK BLIGHT IN WHEAT. 163 
 
 consequently will be starved. Whilst the season 
 continues dry and cold, the exuded sap will re- 
 main like dry gum ; but as it advances, and the 
 weather becomes warm and moist, the gum be- 
 comes moist, soft, and putrefying ; and then 
 forms, and affords a nutritive bed for the mould 
 or fungus ; which grows and increases until 
 it is deprived of moisture, or is so reduced as 
 to be insufficient to sustain it, when it dies ; and 
 according as the season is favourable or un- 
 favourable to its growth, it produces a brown, or 
 black powdery substance, in a proportional quan- 
 tity. Thus then, the foundation or cause of the nust 
 or fungus, is the putrefying matter discharged 
 from the ruptured sap-vessek of the plant : and 
 although the ruptures may be occasioned by a 
 contraction or obstruction of the vessels by 
 atmospheric influence ; the overfulness, or over- 
 luxuriance of the plant, produced by surfeit ; or 
 the being glutted with rank and unwholsome 
 food ; and its incapacity of digestion, and un- 
 healthy obstructions ; renders it more liable to 
 such injuries : and may therefore be considered 
 as the general cause of the disease, blight, or 
 rust. 
 
 I have planted wheat in a rank compost of 
 dung, which from its first appearance in the 
 autumn, during its growth in the winter, and 
 
 M 2 
 
ON THE RUST OR 
 
 in the spring ; maintained excessive, luxuriance, 
 but which was ultimately so reduced by rust, as 
 to be rendered weak and incapable of bringing 
 its seed to perfection ; at the same time, and close 
 alongside ; I also planted wheat in a pure and 
 sweet sand, and supplied it with a solution or 
 infusion of rotten dung, by way of food j this 
 never appeared half so luxuriant as the other, 
 but the stalks or straw grew perfectly healthy, 
 arid free from disease, and the grain was of good 
 quality. 
 
 The following statement by Sir John Sinclair, 
 as well as what has been already quoted, will in 
 every respect be found to corroborate and sus- 
 tain my observations and opinions. 
 
 He says, " As land in too rich a state is apt to 
 " produce rust, it is found to be an effectual 
 " remedy, if previous to a crop of wheat the 
 " dung is applied to a smothering crop, as tares, 
 " hemp. &c, Indeed after cole seed, wheat is 
 " scarcely ever known to be rusted. The gene- 
 " ral culture of that article, and the use of Dutch 
 " ashes impregnated with saline matter, as a 
 " manure, tends greatly to the exemption from 
 " rust, by which, wheat in Flanders is distin- 
 " guished. 
 
 " Potatoes, when the crop is large, have the 
 " same effect ; in Flanders, where the wheat is 
 
BLACK BLIGHT IN WHEAT. 
 
 " never materially injured by rust, potatoes are 
 " considered in its best cultivated district (the 
 " Pays de Waes) as the best preparation for that 
 " crop. If too much dung occasion the pro- 
 " pagation of fungi, which there is reason to 
 " believe is the case, smothering crops, by 
 " exhausting and diminishing the strength of 
 " the dung, may take away that tendency." 
 
 Undoubtedly the tares, cole-seed, potatoes, &c* 
 growing on the manured soil, must reduce, if not 
 wholly consume, its gross and over-luxuriant 
 qualities, and time and exposure, effect a more 
 complete decomposition and evolution of its 
 vitiating effluvia, and thus the great cause being 
 removed, the effect must cease. 
 
 Sir John further says, " Mr. Knight is de- 
 '* cidedly of opinion that the disease is taken up 
 " by the root, every experiment to communi^ 
 " cate it from infected straw to others proving 
 " abortive, and indeed if it were introduced into 
 " the ear of the plant how could it descend, and 
 " infect solely the stem, which is the case, un- 
 " less when the disease is inveterate ?" 
 
 As to the fungus passing into plants by the 
 roots, or being prevented from propagating, by 
 any of the means here pointed out, it appears 
 almost too preposterous to be seriously thought of i 
 
 How difficult do our housewives find it, to ex 
 M 6 
 
166 ON THE RUST OR 
 
 elude the seeds, , or prevent the fungus, growing 
 on their pickles and preserves, even by tied 
 down bladders and tight corks ? And if horse- 
 dung in a mass be placed in certain situations, 
 it is well known that even the large edible mush- 
 rooms will rise and grow where they never were 
 seen before. 
 
 Thus, then, if the cause of the rust or black 
 blight be as I have stated, and the observations 
 both of Sir John Sinclair and Mr. Knight con- 
 firm my opinions, and the observations of Sir 
 Joseph Banks do not controvert them, the 
 remedy is simple and obvious : viz. for the pro- 
 duction of seed crops j let manuring follow, and 
 not immediately precede them ; or at any rate, 
 dung should not be ploughed in, on such lands, 
 immediately before sowing the seeds. 
 
 And it i& equally obvious, that the ploughing 
 in, green crops, must be conducive to the produc- 
 tion of rust. And the feeding off turnips with 
 sheep, or folding them on the land, immediately 
 before sowing, must have a strong tendency to 
 the same effect. 
 
 If, when lands are manured, two or three 
 succulent or green crops be taken off, before it is 
 sown for seed-crops, although the leaf and plant, 
 or straw or haulm, of such crops may not appear 
 so luxuriant in consequence, the seed will be 
 
BLACK BLIGHT IN WHEAT. 
 
 larger in quantity, and finer in quality. > And if, 
 in the general course of cultivation, dung be 
 applied or given to the green crops, which pre- 
 cede the white or seed-crops, the luxuriance of 
 leaf, stalk, &c. will be produced in that form 
 which is most valuable, either as green food, 
 turnips, &c. or hay ; and the succeeding grain- 
 crops would, in no respect, be diminished ; and 
 the straw, from being free from disease, would 
 be much increased in value* 
 
 From what I have stated, if two crops of 
 wheat be desired in four years, the better mode 
 of manuring for them is, to lay on the dung the 
 two first years for green crops, and take the two 
 wheat-crops following, in the last two years. 
 There never was a more widely mistaken notion, 
 than that a supply of dung given one year, can 
 be exhausted either in that or the following year, 
 by cropping with any thing, but by burying it 
 below reach of the roots, or so low that it be- 
 comes inert or poisonous ; the manure may be 
 worse than lost. 
 
 Sir John Sinclair again very justly observes, 
 " By the improvements which may be effected 
 " by the observations of ingenious naturalists, and 
 " the experience of intelligent farmers, there is 
 " every reason to hope that the diseases of wheat 
 " may, in a great measure, be so mitigated in their 
 
 M 4* 
 
168 ON THE &UST, SCC. IN WHEAT. 
 
 " effects, that they will not in future be felt as 
 " a national calamity. For that purpose, how- 
 " ever, it is necessary that the diligent farmer 
 " should seize every opportunity of improving 
 " his knowledge in the diseases of wheat ; should 
 " note down all the circumstances connected 
 " with the subject as they occur, and should 
 " compare his observations with those of others ; 
 " that whether the causes of rust are general or 
 " local, they may as much as possible be ob- 
 " viated." 
 
 To this I will beg leave to add, that however 
 repeatedly, the diligent farmer may have been 
 misled by theory, he cannot be justified in wholly 
 opposing or neglecting science. The opinions I 
 have here endeavoured to explain, are grounded 
 on demonstrative practical experiment. And as it 
 is in the power of every farmer to make the same 
 demonstration, I trust every one will consider 
 it, in justice, due from all, to do so, before they 
 indulge in speaking lightly of them, or in treat- 
 ing them with neglect. 
 
 
169 
 
 ON FALLOWING. 
 
 THE concurring action of the principles 1 have" 
 laid down, will be found correctly to apply to 
 the operation of fallowing, and clearly shew the 
 real value of this process. 
 
 In a general point of view it is obvious, that 
 both the advocates for, and opponents of, the 
 system of fallowing, have indulged in extremes $ 
 the former attributing effects which, under com- 
 mon circumstances, it cannot produce ; and the 
 latter denying those which are clearly evident. 
 I shall however hope to show, that a little giving 
 way on both sides, will tend most to the public, 
 as well as private benefit. 
 
 Sir John Sinclair observes, " Over the greater 
 " part of Europe, it was formerly considered to 
 " be a most advantageous practice, periodically 
 " to dedicate an entire season to the cultivation 
 " of arable land, without raising from it any 
 " crop. It was supposed that the expense would 
 " be amply compensated by the texture of the 
 " soil being ameliorated, by the destruction of 
 " weeds, which would be thus effected, and by 
 " the increased produce of the succeeding crops. 
 
1*70 ON FALLOWING. 
 
 " But when the expenses of cultivation were 
 " augmented, when new crops, as turnips, were 
 " introduced, (which were favourable to the 
 " process of cleaning the ground by their later 
 " period of sowing, and the hoeings they re- 
 " quired,) and when the productions of the soil 
 " became more valuable ; it was natural for the 
 " farmer to consider whether such great sacri- 
 " fices were really necessary, and whether fallows 
 " might not, in many cases, be diminished, and 
 " in others, totally given up. On this subject, 
 " a controversy has arisen between two sects, 
 " the fallowists and anti-fallowists, which has 
 " been conducted with much keenness and 
 " energy. 
 
 " Of late years the question at issue has been 
 " much narrowed. It is now admitted, that 
 " on all light soils, where the turnip-culture can 
 " be practised, fallows are unnecessary ; and 
 " that on strong lands, under a judicious system, 
 " they are not essentially necessary more than 
 " once in the course of a rotation. The subject 
 " under discussion, therefore, is reduced to this 
 " short question : Is it for the interest of a 
 " farmer who cultivates cold, strong, clayey, 
 " adhesive, and wet-bottomed lands, periodi- 
 " cally to fallow them ?" 
 
 This is certainly reducing the eligibility of the 
 
ON FALLOWING. 171 
 
 practice, to a matter of calculation of profit. And 
 as, after all, this must depend entirely on the 
 means of the farmer, it may not be an unjust 
 view of the subject, although a very contracted 
 one. 
 
 But does the operation of fallowing increase 
 or diminish the fertility of the soil ? This is the 
 question undetermined, and is the most import- 
 ant one, and to solve it, it will be necessary to 
 trace the operation of chemical principles to 
 practical results. 
 
 Sir H. Davy says, " The chemical theory of 
 " fallowing is very simple. Fallowing affords 
 " no new source of riches to the soil. It merely 
 " tends to produce an accumulation of decom- 
 " posing matter, which, in the common course 
 " of crops, would be employed as it is formed. 
 " And it is scarcely possible to imagine a single 
 " instance of a cultivated soil which can be sup- 
 " posed to remain fallow for a year with advan- 
 " tage to the farmer. The only cases where 
 " this practice is beneficial, seems to be in the 
 " destruction of weeds, and for cleaning foul 
 " soils." 
 
 Again, " The most important processes for 
 " improving land, are those which have been 
 " already discussed, and that are founded upon 
 " the circumstance of removing certain consti- 
 
ON FALLOWING. 
 
 u tuents from the soil, or adding others, of 
 " changing their nature. But there is an opera- 
 " tion of very ancient practice still much em- 
 " ployed, in which the soil is exposed to the 
 " air, and submitted to processes WHICH ARE 
 " PURELY MECHANICAL, namely, fallowing. 
 
 " The benefits arising from fallowing have 
 " been much overrated ; a summer fallow, or a 
 " clean fallow, may be sometimes necessary in 
 " lands overgrown with weeds, particularly if 
 " they are lands which cannot be pared and burnt 
 4< with advantage, but is certainly unprofitable 
 " as part of a general system of husbandly. 
 
 " It has been supposed by some writers, that 
 " certain principles necessary to fertility are de- 
 " rived from the atmosphere, which are ex- 
 " hausted by a succession of crops, and that these 
 " are again supplied during the repose of theland, 
 " and the exposure of the pulverised soil to the 
 " influence of the air ; but this in truth is not the 
 " case. The earths commonly found in soils 
 " cannot be combined with more oxygene ; some 
 " of them unite to azote, and such of them as 
 " are capable of attracting carbonic acid, are 
 " always saturated with it on those soils in which 
 " the practice of fallowing is adopted. The vague 
 " ancient opinion of the use of nitre, and of 
 " nitrous salts, in vegetation, seems to have been 
 
ON FALLOWING. 173 
 
 " one of 1 the principal speculative reasons for the 
 " defence of summer fallows. 
 
 " Nitrous salts are produced during the expo- 
 " sure of soils containing vegetable and animal 
 " remains, and in greatest abundance in hot 
 " weather 5 but it is probably by the combination 
 " of azote from these remains, with oxygene in 
 " the atmosphere, that the acid is formed, and 
 " at the expense of an element which otherwise 
 " would have formed ammonia, the compounds 
 " of which, as is evident from what was stated in 
 " the last lecture, are much more efficacious 
 " than the nitrous compounds in assisting vege- 
 " tation. 
 
 " When weeds are buried in the soil, by their 
 " gradual decomposition they furnish a certain 
 " quantity of soluble matter j but it may be 
 " doubted whether there is as much useful ma- 
 " nure in the land at the end of a clean fallow, 
 " as at the time the vegetables clothing the sur- 
 " face were first ploughed in. Carbonic acid gas 
 " is formed during the whole time by the action 
 " of the vegetable matter upon the oxygene of 
 " the air, and the greater part of it is lost to the 
 " soil in which it is formed, and dissipated in the 
 f atmosphere." 
 
 The reasoning here offered by Sir Humphry 
 Davy, affords further proof of the possibility of 
 
174 ON FALLOWING. 
 
 staggering even truth itself by a plausible theory, 
 when practical observation is not brought to aid 
 the judgment. 
 
 To show the fallacy of the objections above 
 stated, and to prove that by the operation of 
 chemical principles, fallowing must add to the 
 fertility of the soil, we need only refer to what 
 has already been said on the nature of the food 
 of plants : however, the more clearly to establish 
 those principles which are most important, I 
 shall endeavour further to elucidate their appli- 
 cability. Admitting what Sir Humphry states 
 to be fact, " That the earths commonly found 
 " in soils cannot be combined with more oxygene, 
 " and none of them unite with azote j" yet the 
 remains of vegetables which are always in the soil 
 may ; superfluous or stagnant water may also be 
 dispersed ; and the formation of carburetted hy- 
 drogen gas prevented : for as he further says, "In 
 " the production of a plant from seed, some reser- 
 " voir of nourishment is needed before the roots 
 " can supply sap, and this reservoir is the cotyle- 
 " don, in which it is stored up in an insoluble form, 
 " and protected if necessary during the winter, 
 " and rendered soluble by agents which are con- 
 " stantly present on the surface. The change of 
 " starch and coagulated mucilage into sugar, con- 
 " nected with the absorption of oxygene, maybe 
 
ON FALLOWING. 175 
 
 " rather compared to a process by fermentation, 
 " than to that of respiration ; it is a change ef- 
 " fected upon unorganised matter, and can be ar- 
 " tificially imitated; and in most of the chemical 
 " changes that occur, when vegetable compounds 
 " are exposed to air, oxygene is absorbed, and 
 " carbonic acid formed or evolved." 
 
 Then why deny the presence or action of such 
 agents, to change and prepare both organised and 
 inert vegetable matter, and rendering them so- 
 luble ; and reducing them to a proper state as 
 food for plants ; when thrown up and exposed to 
 the surface by fallowing ? 
 
 The very idea of fallowing, presupposes the 
 land intended to be submitted to the operation, 
 to be charged with vegetable matter, both orga- 
 nised and inert, by long exclusion from the action 
 of the sun, air, and light ; and the earth being 
 turned up to the depth of the fibrous roots 
 of the plants, and the plants themselves being 
 severed and turned upside down, and ex- 
 posed to the effects of a drying sun &c., the 
 vitality of the whole is (as far as can be done 
 by a simple operation) destroyed, and their sub- 
 stance, with that of the before, inert matter, is 
 exposed in the manner best adapted for oxydise- 
 ment, or the production of sugar ; which in all 
 cases is proved to be not only the most soluble, 
 but the state most productive of carbonic acid, 
 
176 ON FALLOWING. 
 
 that vegetable matter can be placed in ; or the 
 best adapted as food for plants ; and particularly 
 of those which are desired to be prolific in fruits, 
 seeds, bulbs, and tubers. And as to such an ex- 
 posure to the atmosphere, producing either nitre 
 or ammonia ; it certainly cannot be likely, that 
 lands submitted to common cultivation, can be 
 sufficiently pregnant with animal and vegetable 
 matter to produce either ; but if it does so, nitre 
 is the most probable ; and this is constituted 
 to be the most profitable ; for nitre being com- 
 posed of oxygene and nitrogene, it contains one 
 of the vital principles of plants, and of which 
 they cannot take up too much, as they possess 
 the power of expelling any superfluous quantity. 
 But ammonia contains nothing that a plant can 
 need, it being composed of hydrogene ; and ni- 
 trogene. By a due supply of water, plants ob- 
 tain a due supply of hydrogene ; and nitrogene 
 is worse than useless, as it produces disease j and 
 indeed, the wise providence of nature seems here 
 distinctly displayed, by making ammoniacal gas 
 so much lighter than the atmospheric air, that it 
 may as speedily fly off as it is formed. 
 
 But whether the additional fertility obtained 
 by fallowing, can be equal to that produced by 
 other operations, is another question ; and is> 
 indeed, one more of expediency than of scientific 
 
ON FALLOWING. 177 
 
 demonstration ; but in determining this, we must 
 take into consideration an axiom, that (as has 
 been before observed) seems not to have occurred 
 to Sir Humphry Davy ; viz. that plants may be 
 overfed, and diseased by unwholesome food. We 
 will therefore suppose that part of a foul field, 
 even of a middle quality, were laid up in fallow ; 
 and part manured, or laid down to turnips, and 
 fed off with sheep ; and both ploughed without 
 any further manuring to either part, and cropped 
 with wheat, Query, would not the quality of 
 the grain and straw of the fallow land make up 
 for the difference in bulk on the other ; taking 
 into consideration the casualties of rust, and 
 the being lodged or blown down ? and whether 
 the clean state of the land after fallowing would 
 not more than compensate the difference of 
 profit arising from the turnips ? 
 
 This is the simple question at issue, and which 
 cannot be fairly answered, without reference to 
 the state of the land which is to be submitted to 
 the operation. If the land be foul, or full of 
 vegetable matter, both organised and inert, and 
 withal stiff and wet; on the principles already ex- 
 plained, fallowing must certainly be a beneficial 
 operation ; but if the land be free from vegetable 
 matter; the idea of increasing the fertility of the 
 soil, by a year's exposure to the atmosphere, can- 
 
 N 
 
1?8 ON FALLOWING. 
 
 not be supported by any chemical principle : nor 
 can I believe it could ever have proved good in 
 practice. 
 
 It is admitted on all sides, that a vegetable 
 being destroyed and decomposed, and again de- 
 posited on the spot where it grew, adds much to 
 the capacity of the soil ; and, after what has been 
 said, a doubt can scarcely exist whether, if it be 
 exposed in such a manner, during the decompo- 
 sition, to the influence of the sun, air, and light, 
 as to become duly oxydized ; it will add more to 
 the fertility of the soil, than if it were decomposed 
 in a situation immersed in water, or obscured 
 irom the light, heat, and oxygene. 
 
 The consumption of vegetables by animals, 
 effects much the same change, as exposure to the 
 sun and air ; that is, by favoring oxydizement or 
 by rendering the substance not only more solu- 
 ble, but reducing it to a state more readily to 
 absorb oxygene ; and particularly when the dung 
 and urine are united: and these changes, aided 
 by the continual turning of the soil by the plough, 
 universally constitute the most effective opera- 
 tions in cultivating the earth. 
 
 As to the loss of a season, and a crop of vege- 
 tables, as food for animals, or as manure to the 
 land; the object of fallowing, on the principles I 
 have explained, may be fully sustained and acted 
 
ON FALLOWING. 
 
 up to, without incurring such loss; as the requi- 
 site alteration in the vegetable matter contained 
 in the soil, may be as effectually produced during 
 one dry summer month as in twelve. 
 
 Any green crop, that will admit of being re- 
 moved in the months of June or July, may be 
 raised without detriment ; thus, grass, clover, or 
 tares, may be removed, either as hay, or green 
 food for cattle ; or if these or other greens be in- 
 tended as manure, they should be cut and dried 
 before they are buried or ploughed in ; for, as be- 
 fore observed, the operation of making grass into 
 hay, is the conversion of mucus into sugar; and, 
 therefore, hay, as a manure, will be found very 
 superior in its effects, to green grass. And when 
 land is manured for turnips or rape, for feed- 
 ing, as a preparation for a wheat crop; if rust or 
 laying down of the corn be an object, the feed 
 (for the reasons stated) may be carted off and 
 eaten on other lands. 
 
 Conformable to his general notions, Sir H. 
 Davy again expresses his dissent to the operation 
 of fallowing. He says, " When weeds are buried 
 " in the soil, by their gradual decomposition 
 " they furnish a certain quantity of soluble mat- 
 " ter; but it may be doubted whether there is as 
 " much useful manure in the land, at the end of 
 " a clean fallow, as at the time the vegetables 
 
180 ON FALLOWING. 
 
 " clothing the surface were first ploughed in ;" 
 but how does this accord with his ideas on the 
 effects of paring and burning ? on the subject 
 of which, he very justly observes " Many ob- 
 " scure causes have been referred to for the pur- 
 " pose of explaining the effects of paring and 
 "burning; but, I believe, they may be referred 
 " entirely to the diminution of the coherence and 
 "tenacity of clays, and to the destruction of 
 "inert and useless vegetable matter, and its con- 
 * version into manure/' 
 
 Ift then, the fertilizing effects of fire be wholly 
 comprised in its acting thus, as an alterative ; 
 how can it be denied, that the same effects, 
 though in a more moderate degree, are produced 
 by a summer fallow? Fire is undoubtedly a 
 powerful agent in fertilizing the land, and more 
 particularly when applied to stiff wet clays. 
 
 In a general point of view, I agree with Sir 
 H. Davy, as to the effects of paring and burn- 
 ing, and in many of his ideas as to the peculiar 
 principles of its operation, and particularly when 
 he says, 
 
 " When clay or tenacious soils are burnt, the 
 " effect is of the same kind ; they are brought 
 " nearer to a state analogous to that of sands." 
 
 " In the manufacture of bricks, the general 
 " principle is well illustrated ; if a piece of dry 
 
ON FALLOWING. 181 
 
 " brick earth be applied to the tongue, it will ad- 
 " here to it very strongly, in consequence of its 
 " power to absorb water ; but after it has been 
 " burnt, there will scarcely be a sensible ad- 
 " hesion." 
 
 " The process of burning renders the soil less 
 " compact, less tenacious, and retentive of moist- 
 " ure ; and when properly applied, may con- 
 " vert a matter that was stiff, damp, and, in 
 " consequence, cold, into one powdery, dry, and 
 " warm, and much more proper as a bed for 
 " vegetable life." 
 
 " The great objections made by speculative 
 " chemists to paring and burning is, that it de- 
 " stroys vegetable and animal matter, or the 
 " manure in the soil ; but in cases in which the 
 " texture of its earthy ingredients is permanently 
 " improved, there is more than a compensation 
 "for this temporary disadvantage. And in some 
 " soils, where there is an excess O/^INERT VEGETA- 
 " BLE MATTER, the destruction of it must be 
 " beneficial, and the carbonaceous matter re- 
 " maining in the ashes may be more useful to 
 " the crop than the vegetable fibre from which 
 " it was produced." 
 
 As Sir Humphry very justly observes, whe- 
 ther the operation of burning increases or dimi- 
 nishes the soluble carbonaceous matter, is of 
 
 N3 
 
#N FALLOWING. 
 
 little importance, as these effects are compara- 
 tively transient ; but what is termed the mecha- 
 nical change in the texture of the soil, is of the 
 greatest importance, as in this respect the land 
 may not only be considered as permanently im- 
 proved, and altered from that state in which it is 
 at all times uncertain in its produce ; capable of 
 being worked only at particular and short inter- 
 vals; difficult and expensive in its preparation 
 for seed-crops ; and, in general, ill appropriated 
 for feeding cattle ; to a state free from all those 
 casual defects ; but it is rendered less capable of 
 forming and retaining that enemy to healthy vege- 
 tation, STAGNANT WATER, and much more capa- 
 ble of receiving and applying, the source of all 
 vitality and prolificacy in vegetables, FRESH WATER. 
 These are the great and most valuable effects of 
 fire, when applied as an agent in cultivation : and 
 fall owing approaches the nearest to fire, in its 
 effects, of any operation in agriculture. 
 
 It is well known, that animals require a con- 
 stant supply of fresh air, to sustain a healthy ex- 
 istence; and the constant supply of fresh water, 
 is no less essential to the healthy existence of 
 vegetables. 
 
 The soil and subsoil that is constituted and 
 situated the best to sustain these principles, is 
 always the most valuable f and every operation in 
 
ON FALLOWING. 
 
 husbandry that is known to produce fertility in 
 the soil, acts in unison with them ; indeed, under- 
 draining proves, comparatively, that agricultural 
 plants do better without water, than when immer- 
 sed in stagnant water ; and irrigation shews, that 
 when rapidly changing, a plant can scarcely have 
 too much water. Digging and ploughing, and 
 hoeing, stirring, and turning up the soil; not only 
 loosens the texture, and thereby admits a more 
 perfect percolation of water; but spongy vegeta- 
 ble matter, that, whilst under the earth, retains 
 water in a state of stagnation, is brought upon 
 the surface; the unwholesome moisture evapor- 
 ated, and the substance reduced to a state more 
 absorbent, but less retentive. 
 
 When the earth is in a proper state, or the 
 soil and subsoil properly constituted, and under 
 proper circumstances ; a constant circulation or 
 motion of the water up and down among the 
 roots of vegetables, is going on; thus, when rain 
 falls in sufficient quantity; by its gravity, it per- 
 colates and sinks through the soil. And again, 
 as soon as the surface of the earth is sufficiently 
 rarefied to pass off what it retains in vapour, the 
 motion is reversed, and by the capillary attraction 
 of the soil the water is again raised, and brought 
 to the surface, and in its passage upwards again 
 comes in contact with the roots of vegetables; and 
 
 N 4 
 
184 ON FALLOWING. 
 
 in this manner a continued change of water and 
 fresh supplies of the vital principle are produced. 
 It is evidently this principle which establishes 
 the greatest value of the operation of hoeing. 
 And although not recognised by Jethro Tull, 
 was what gave effect to his favourite process of 
 horse-hoeing. It is this also which produced 
 the increased fertility so much and so justly ex- 
 tolled by Mr. Curwen, in his mode of culture, 
 that of repeatedly stirring the surface between 
 the growing vegetables ; and not, as he supposed, 
 the absorption of the volatile gas thus extricated, 
 by the leaves of plants. Had Mr. Curwen's con- 
 ception been just, the plants at a considerable 
 distance from the loosened soil, must have been 
 benefited by the floating of the vapour, or gas, 
 by the wind, but which I take for granted was 
 not the case. The fact is, clay, as soon as sa- 
 turated with water, retains it in a state of stag- 
 nation, to the exclusion of fresh supplies : and 
 thus, plants growing in it, are exposed to poison- 
 ing and starvation. And when the surface is 
 operated upon by a drying sun, it contracts and 
 opens, in large clefts or fissures, through which 
 the vapour escapes; whilst the roots are closely 
 grasped in a dry mass, and thus by the other ex- 
 treme, the vegetable is placed in a state of starv- 
 ation. By repeatedly hoeing arid stirring the 
 
 14 
 
ON FALLOWING. 185 
 
 surface, the adhesion is counteracted, and the 
 rain-water, with the soluble manure, more per- 
 fectly distributed among the roots ; and the con- 
 traction of the surface in drying, being pre- 
 vented, or the fissures and clefts being closed or 
 filled up, the water raised by evaporation is 
 more equally diverted among the roots. A pro- 
 per attention to, and comprehension of, those 
 principles, can alone enable a person to judge of 
 the eligibility of paring and burning, and to es- 
 timate its probable value when applied to parti- 
 cular soils. 
 
 It is evident, that the most important and per- 
 manent effects of fire consists in its imparting 
 calcareous quality to the earth ; it must therefore 
 be as evident that soils which naturally contain a 
 due proportion of calcareous earth, such as chalk, 
 limestone, marie, &c. cannot be so much im- 
 proved by burning. The effect of dressing lands 
 with lime and marie, is to ? certain degree the 
 same as fire; and therefore those lands only, 
 which are deficient in calcareous matter can be 
 permanently benefited by the addition of those 
 substances. Calcareous earths also anticipate 
 the effects of putrefaction, by reducing vegetable 
 and animal substances to soluble oxydes, and 
 thus they prevent a loss of carbon in the forma- 
 tion of carbonated hydrogen gas. 
 
186 
 
 FALLOWING. 
 
 And from the effect of these operations, other 
 important conclusions may be drawn, viz. that 
 the working of the plough^ the hoe, the harrow, 
 and the roller, cannot well be overdone, during 
 the dry weather of spring, summer, and autumn ; 
 and that it cannot be too seldom done in wet 
 weather and in winter ; as these operations, when 
 the surface is dry, open the pores : and, when 
 wet, close them. 
 
 In all cases, where the soil is so tenacious and 
 retentive of water, as to render it necessary to 
 lay the land in narrow ridges for the purpose of 
 getting rid of it; fire may be applied in the man- 
 ner before explained, so as to effect such an im- 
 provement as would amply repay both the land- 
 lord and the tenant any expense that may be 
 incurred by the operation. 
 
 When lands are laid in narrow ridges, the best 
 and most effective manure, or that which is laid 
 on the surface, is washed away, and the spaces 
 occupied by the furrows are wasted, and so much 
 land lost. The surface-soil of such lands being 
 made friable, and open in its texture, sufficiently 
 to admit of a free percolation of water to a proper 
 depth, and well under-drained, would not only be 
 rendered more productive, but like fine sandy 
 loams, it would admit of working at all times and 
 seasons. 
 
ON FALLOWING. 187 
 
 I once saw a very large field, of a stiff foxy 
 clay, laid down to turnips ; one half had been 
 reduced by burning, and the other not : the 
 part that was burnt, was clothed with as fine a 
 crop of roots, as could be wished for ; whilst on 
 the other, the seed, although the same in both 
 cases, and sown at the same time, appeared to 
 have failed, there being only a few thin patches 
 of plants ; and the cause was obvious. The 
 surface of the unburnt clay was closed, and ren- 
 dered impervious, immediately after sowing, by 
 rain ; but the calcination of the soil in the other, 
 kept it open, and made it accessible to the air, 
 which is positively necessary for the germination 
 of seeds. 
 
 The reducing of clay by fire, may be con- 
 sidered as the best mode of rendering surface 
 draining unnecessary. 
 
 Sir John Sinclair, after a very comprehensive 
 and minute detail of all the different modes and 
 effects of draining, very properly says in con- 
 clusion, " So sensible have landed proprietors 
 *' become of the deep interests they have in ex- 
 " ecuting this most important species of improve- 
 " ment, on a liberal and extended scale, that it 
 " is a practice with many, to have a general plan 
 " for the drainage and regular division of the 
 different farms, when their estates are newly 
 
188 ON FALLOWING. 
 
 " let; and the work is thus likely to be completed 
 " in a methodical, substantial, and permanent 
 * manner, under professed drainers, and labour- 
 " ers solely employed on this essential work. 
 " On this great scale of drainage, the connection 
 " of one farm, or part of an estate, with another, 
 " renders the effect more complete, and the 
 " ultimate charges much less. Indeed, the te- 
 " nants are so sensible of the advantages of this 
 " system, that they give it a preference to 
 *' having the work done at their own expense, 
 " and in their own manner." 
 
 And on the effects of draining, he further very 
 justly observes : " On the whole, there is no 
 " means by which the value of land can be ad- 
 " vanced, or from which, when usefully applied, 
 " so many advantages can be derived, at a mo- 
 " derate expense, as that of draining. The 
 " owner is benefited by an increase of rent ; the 
 " occupier by that of produce ; and the public, 
 " by being thus supplied with greater quantities 
 " of the most essential commodities, and by hav- 
 " ing a source of useful employment furnished 
 ** to the labouring classes of the community." 
 
189 
 
 ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, AND THE 
 AGENCY OF THE EARTHS IN VEGETATION. 
 
 THE surface of the earth is a variable com- 
 pound, but as it respects vegetation, it is not 
 necessary to pursue its analysis beyond the fol- 
 lowing simple divisions, viz. calx, or the cal- 
 careous ; silex, or the siliceous ; clay, or the 
 argillaceous ; magnesia, or the magnesian ; and 
 carbon, or the carbonaceous, or, as this is com- 
 monly called, mould. 
 
 The first four substances, are what Miller 
 properly calls the containing part, or body, bed, 
 or couch ; and the fifth substance or mould, 
 (which is the result of decayed animal and ve- 
 getable matter,) the part contained. 
 
 It is clearly proved that neither of the four 
 substances, calx, clay, magnesia, or silex, in a 
 simple state, whether separate or combined, will 
 support a plant ; and that the vegetative power of 
 every part of the earth, is determined by the 
 quantity of mould, or animal and vegetable mat- 
 ter it contains. 
 
 On the earths, as forming a component part 
 of plants, Mr. Kirwan says, " The next most 
 
190 ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 
 
 " important ingredient to the nourishment of 
 " plants, is earth : and of the different earths, the 
 " calcareous seems the most necessary, as it is 
 " contained in rain water ; and absolutely speak- 
 " ing, many plants may grow without imbibing 
 " any other ; M. Ruckert is persuaded that 
 " earth and water in proper portions, forms the 
 " sole nutriment of plants : but M. Giobert has 
 " clearly shown the contrary, for having mixed 
 " pure earth of alum, silex, calcareous earth, and 
 " magnesia, in various proportions, and moist- 
 " ened them with water, he found that no grain 
 " would grow in them ; but when moistened 
 " with water from a dung-hill, corn grew in 
 *' them prosperously; hence the necessity of the 
 '* carbonaceous principle is apparent." 
 
 He also says, " Earths cannot enter into 
 plants, but in a state of solution ; or at least 
 " only when suspended with water in a state of 
 " division, as minute as if they really had been 
 " dissolved ; that siliceous earths may be sus- 
 " pended in such a state of division, appears 
 " from various experiments, particularly those 
 " of Bergman, who found it thus diffused in the 
 " purest waters of Upsal ; and it is equally cer- 
 " tain that it enters copiously into vegetables : 
 " both his experiments, especially those of Macci, 
 * establish this point beyond contradiction. Ar- 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 191 
 
 " gillaceous earth may also be finely difilised, so 
 " as to pass through the best of filtres ; so may 
 " also calx, as appears from the quantity Mar- 
 " graaf found in the purest rain water." 
 
 On this part of the subject, after reciting a 
 great number of experiments, Sir Humphry 
 Davy observes, " The general results of this 
 " experiment, are very much opposed to the 
 " idea of the composition of the earths by plants, 
 " from any of the elements found in the atmo- 
 " sphere or the water." 
 
 He also says, " As the evidence on the sub- 
 "je.ct now stands, it seems fair to conclude, 
 " that the different earths and saline substances, 
 " found in the organs of plants, are supplied 
 * by the soils in which they grow, and in no 
 " cases composed by new arrangements of the 
 " elements in air or water." 
 
 Here again is a great difference in the opinion 
 of those great chemists, and on a most import- 
 ant point; it being admitted that earths are 
 a necessary ingredient in the composition of 
 plants, the question naturally arises, how, and 
 in what proportions, and in what state, is it re- 
 quired by vegetables ? If Sir Humphry Davy's 
 conclusions are just, a minute examination or 
 analysis of soils, would be requisite to form a 
 correct judgment of its capacity ; and to these 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 
 
 lengths he has gone, and given the ingredients 
 and proportions of several fertile soils ; he has 
 also described the method of analyzing soils; 
 but the quantity of earth required by plants, for 
 their various compounds, is so small, as beyond 
 all doubt to sustain Mr. Kirwan's opinion, that 
 it is supplied by water. 
 
 That the clearest spring water contains a 
 quantity of earth, every person may obtain oc- 
 ular demonstration of, by examining the inside 
 of a tea kettle, in which water has been boiled for 
 some time ; the earth that will be found adhering 
 to it, must have been deposited from water. 
 
 Thus then, as far as the earths are concerned 
 as an article of consumption, or a necessary 
 component in the food of plants, we may rest 
 satisfied with the natural composition of most 
 soils, and direct our attention only to its consti- 
 tution, as it influences the absorption, retention, 
 and distribution of water ; and to its chemical 
 powers, in regulating and determining the ex- 
 tent and effect of the different fermentations, 
 combinations, and decompositions, which are 
 requisite for the reduction and preparation of 
 the various substances which constitute the food 
 of plants. 
 
 If the earth was left solely to the action of 
 the natural and chemical principles of affinity* 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 193 
 
 attraction, repulsion, &c. the accumulation, or 
 concentration, of the separate primitive sub- 
 stances ; or of vegetable and animal matter or 
 mould; may be too great to raise and sustain 
 plants in a healthy and fruitful state, and such 
 may be the case with other bodies, either simple 
 or combined ; we therefore find that nature has 
 provided the means of averting those extremes, 
 by reducing and blending, or mixing them, and 
 this by the operation of insects and reptiles ; 
 as has been before observed, the earth worms 
 seem peculiarly formed for this purpose ; by their 
 means the different substrata of clay, calx, sand, 
 &c. are covered with a stratum, compounded 
 of the finely divided matter of its composition, 
 forming what is called loam, or the soil; these 
 little creatures, in making their passages or in- 
 roads, have no other means of clearing their 
 way, than by eating the opposing matter, carry- 
 ing it to the surface and there throwing it up : 
 hence we find, that every part of the globe that 
 supports vegetables is furnished, or covered, 
 with an admixture of the different earths, form- 
 ing the soil, of greater or less depth ; and the 
 depth of this stratum or covering, the degree 
 of concentration, and proportion of the different 
 substances, the nature of the substrata, as it 
 regards the percolation and retention of water; 
 
194 ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 
 
 the quantity of water supplied ; and the expo- 
 sure to the sun, air, and light, determine the 
 natural produce of the general substance or soiL 
 
 From what is here said, so far from earth 
 worms being an enemy to the farmer, they are 
 his best friends ; without them his lands would 
 soon become impenetrable to air or water, and 
 hence sterile and unproductive ; and it is cer- 
 tain earth worms never wound, or prey upon 
 the sound or living parts of seeds, roots, or 
 plants. 
 
 As Mr. Kirwan observes, the calcareous earths 
 seem to be the most necessary as a component 
 part of the food of plants ; from its peculiar 
 chemical powers, it is also most necessary as an 
 operative agent in the preparation and reduction 
 of animal and vegetable substances, and in due 
 proportion, it is also well adapted to render the 
 other more tenacious substances permeable to 
 water and air, all which have been before ex- 
 plained. 
 
 But that state, in which the operation of the 
 calcareous earths have been found to be the 
 most powerful, is lime. This singular substance 
 is never found in a native state ; but from the 
 simplicity of its formation, and very extraor- 
 dinary powers, its uses and application in the 
 arts is most extensive, and perhaps no produc- 
 tion, from its universal adaptation, ever obtained 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 1Q5 
 
 or deserved more attention from the chemists ; 
 but I very much doubt whether any person has - 
 yet been able to give a demonstrative definition 
 of the principles of its various action. 
 
 The application of lime in agriculture has 
 been justly described to have rendered sterile 
 lands fertile, and fertile lands sterile. To speak 
 of it, therefore, as a manure, is evidently absurd 
 and calculated to mislead. The meaning of the 
 term alterative, as it is used in medicine, is ge- 
 nerally understood, and this appears to me to be 
 the proper denomination for lime, when applied 
 to the cultivation of land. 
 
 Sir Humphry Davy, has given a clear and 
 minute detail of the component parts of the 
 basis of lime, or lime-stone, and of the chemical 
 principles of its formation and action; but either 
 from a want of a more marked distinction be- 
 tween the effects of quick lime and slacked lime, 
 or from some other cause, his observations, by 
 no means accord with mine. 
 
 He says, " Lime forms a kind of insoluble 
 " soap with oily matters, and then gradually 
 " decomposes them by separating from them 
 " oxygene and carbon ; it tends to diminish, 
 " likewise, the nutritive powers of albumen from 
 " the same causes, and always destroys, to 
 " certain extent, the efficacy of animal manures, 
 
 o 2 
 
196 ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 
 
 " either by combining with certain of their ele- 
 " ments, or by giving to them new arrange- 
 " ments. Lime should never be applied with 
 *' animal manures, unless they are too rich, or 
 " for the purposes of preventing noxious efflu- 
 M via; as in certain cases mentioned in the last 
 " lecture, it is injurious when mixed with any 
 ** common dung, and tends to render the extrac- 
 " tive matter insoluble." 
 
 Now, as I have before observed, I have mixed 
 the crassamentum, or clotted part of blood, with 
 quick lime, which formed a kind of insoluble 
 soap, and was therefore inapplicable as food for 
 plants ; but mixed with slacked lime it formed a 
 perfectly soluble soap, and thus rendered the 
 albumen immediately applicable and inodorous, 
 which left to itself could not have become so, 
 until it had undergone the putrefactive ferment- 
 ation, and have thus generated and diffused a 
 most noxious effluvia. 
 
 He again says, " In those cases in which fer- 
 " mentation is useful to produce nutriment from 
 " vegetable substances, lime is always effica- 
 " cious." Now in the experiment I have just 
 explained, it prevented the fermentation, and I 
 have always found this to be its peculiar pro- 
 perty. 
 
 Parkes says, " It appears from several late 
 " experiments carefully made, that sugar is com- 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 197 
 
 " posed entirely of hydrogene, oxygen, and car- 
 " bon. Mr. Cruikshank made many experi- 
 " ments on fermentation, and invariably found 
 " that whenever he added a fourth substance to 
 " the three which compose saccharine matter, no 
 " fermentation took place ; he tried lime, and at 
 " another time a small quantity of potash, and 
 " the addition of either prevented fermentation." 
 
 Sir Humphry Davy also says, " Quick lime 
 " in its pure state, whether in powder or dis- 
 " solved in water, is injurious to plants." 
 
 I have found slacked lime, when sown or 
 spread over plants of all kinds and stages of 
 growth, to destroy slugs, effectually perform this, 
 and without in the least injuring the plants. 
 
 As it must appear from these observations, 
 that I cannot practically and beneficially, further 
 apply the inferences of Sir Humphry Davy, 
 regarding the uses of lime in agriculture; I shall 
 not obtrude any further remarks on his ideas 
 on the subject ; but shall give an extract from 
 the Encyclopaedia Britannica, which appears to 
 me, to be more clearly, if not correctly, explan- 
 atory of the uses and effects of lime in agri- 
 culture : but even this author, seems either not 
 to have understood the principles of the action 
 of lime, or to have erroneously described them. 
 He speaks of lime as a septic, and of its assisting 
 
 o 3 
 
198 ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 
 
 and hastening putrefaction ; but as before shown? 
 lime possesses a directly opposite quality; it not 
 only prevents, but arrests putrefaction, and is 
 therefore in fact, antiseptic ; and it is the action 
 of this principle which renders soils prolific. 
 Lime m, certainly, a most powerful agent in the 
 decomposition of animal and vegetable matter, 
 but it is on a principle more analogous to that 
 of fire \ as in the instances before stated, it not 
 only prevents the effects of putrefaction, which 
 are obnoxious to vegetables, but it accelerates 
 the formation of those compounds which are 
 essential to fertility. 
 
 It is stated in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, 
 " Where the ground has been suffered to remain 
 " uncultivated for many ages, producing all 
 " that time succulent plants, which are easily 
 " putrefied, and trees, the leaves of which, like- 
 " wise contribute to enrich the ground, by their 
 "falling off and mixing with it, the soil will in a 
 " manner be totally made up of pure vegetable 
 " earth, and be the richest when cultivated, that 
 " can be imagined* This was the case with the 
 " lands of America ; they had remained unculti- 
 " vated perhaps since the creation, and were 
 " endowed with an extraordinary degree of fer- 
 " tility ; nevertheless, we are assured by one 
 '* who went to America, in order to purchase 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 199 
 
 " lands there, that such grounds as had been 
 " long cultivated, were so much exhausted, as 
 " to b worse than the generality of ground in 
 " this country. Here then we have an example 
 " of one species of poor soil, namely, one that 
 " has been formerly very rich, but has been 
 " deprived by repeated cropping, of the greatest 
 " part of vegetable food it contained. The 
 " farmer who is in possession of such ground, 
 " would no doubt willingly restore it to its 
 " former state ; the present question is, what 
 " must be done in order to obtain this 'end ? 
 " We have mentioned several kinds of manures, 
 -" which long practice has recommended as ser- 
 " viceable for improving ground. We shall sup- 
 " pose the fanner tries lime or chalk ; for, as has 
 << been seen, their operations upon the soil must 
 " be precisely the same. This substance being 
 ** of a septic nature, will act upon such parts of 
 " the soil as are not putrefied or but imperfectly 
 "so; in consequence of which, the farmer will 
 " reap a better crop than formerly. The sep- 
 " tic nature of the lime is not altered by any 
 " length of time. In ploughing the ground the 
 " lime is more and more perfectly mixed with 
 " it, and gradually exerts its power on every 
 " putrescible matter it touches. As long a* 
 " any matter of this kind remains, the farmer 
 
 o4 
 
200 ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 
 
 " will reap good crops ; but when the putres- 
 " cible matter is all exhausted, the ground then 
 " becomes perfectly barren, and the caustic 
 " qualities of the lime are most unjustly blamed 
 " for burning the ground, and reducing it to a 
 " caput mortuum ; while it is plain, the lime has 
 " only done its office, and made the soil yield 
 *' all that it was capable of yielding. 
 
 " When ground has been long uncultivated, 
 " producing all the time plants not succulent, 
 " but such as are very difficultly dissolved, and 
 " in a manner incapable of putrefaction, there 
 " the soil will be excessively barren, and yield 
 very scanty crops, though cultivated with the 
 " greatest care. Of this kind are those lands 
 " covered with heath, which are found to be 
 " the most barren of any, and the most difficultly 
 " brought to yield good crops In this case 
 " lime will be as serviceable as it was detri- 
 " mental in the other ; for by its septic qualities, 
 " it will continually reduce more and more of 
 the soil to a putrid state, and thus there will 
 *' be a constant succession of better and better 
 " crops, by the continual use of lime, when the 
 ** quantity first laid on has exerted all its force. 
 By a continued use of this manure, the ground 
 ** will be gradually brought nearer and nearer 
 * to the nature of garden mould, and no doubt, 
 
 14 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 201 
 
 " by proper care, might be made as good as 
 " any : but it will be as great a mistake to ima- 
 " gine, that by the use of lime this kind of 
 " soil may be rendered perpetually fertile, as to 
 " think that the other was naturally so ; for 
 " though lime enriches the soil, it does so, not 
 " by adding vegetable food to it, but by pre- 
 " paring what it already contains ; and when all 
 " i^ properly prepared, it must as certainly be 
 " exhausted as in the other case. 
 
 " Here then we have examples of two kinds of 
 " poor soils ; one of which is totally destroyed, 
 " the other greatly improved by lime ; and 
 " which therefore require very different manures : 
 " lime being more proper for the last than dung, 
 " while dung being more proper to restore an 
 " exhausted soil than lime, ought only to be 
 " used for the first. Beside dunging land which 
 " has been exhausted by long cropping, it is of 
 " great service to let it lie fallow for some time ; 
 " for to this it owed its original fertility, and 
 " what gave the fertility originally cannot fail 
 " to restore it in some degree. 
 
 " By attending to the distinctions between 
 " the reasons for the poverty of the two soils 
 "just now mentioned, we shall always be able 
 " to judge with certainty, in what cases lime is 
 ft to be used, and when dung is proper. The 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 
 
 " mere poverty of a soil is not a criterion where- 
 " by we can judge ; we must consider what hath 
 " made it poor. If it is naturally so, we may 
 " almost infallibly conclude that it will become 
 " better by being manured with lime. If it is 
 " artificially poor, or exhausted by continual 
 " cropping, we may conclude that lime will en- 
 " tirely destroy it. We apprehend that it is this 
 " natural kind of poverty only, which Mr. An- 
 " derson says in his Essays on Agriculture, may 
 " be remedied by lime \ for we can scarce think 
 " that experience would direct any person to 
 " put lime upon land already exhausted. His 
 " words are, Calcareous matters act as power- 
 " fully upon land that is naturally poor, as upon 
 " land that is more richly impregnated with 
 " those substances that tend to produce a 
 " luxuriant vegetation. Writers on agriculture 
 " have long been in the custom of dividing ma- 
 " nures into two classes; viz. enriching manures, 
 " or those that tended directly to render the 
 " soil more prolific, however sterile it may be; 
 " among the foremost of which was dung : 
 " exciting manures, or those that were supposed 
 66 to have a tendency to render the soil more 
 48 prolific, merely by acting upon those enriching 
 " manures that had been formerly in the soiV 
 " and giving them a new stimulus, so as to en- 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 203 
 
 " able them to operate anew upon that soil which 
 " they had formerly fertilised, in which class of 
 " stimulating manures, lime was always allowed 
 " to hold the foremost place. 
 
 " In consequence of this theory, it would 
 " follow that lime could only be of use as a ma- 
 " nure when applied to rich soils, and when 
 " applied to poor soils would produce hardly 
 " any, or even perhaps doubtful effects. 
 
 " I will frankly acknowledge, that I myself 
 " was so far imposed upon by the beauty of this 
 " theory, as to be hurried along with the general 
 " current of mankind, in the firm persuasion of the 
 " truth of this observation, and for many years 
 " did not sufficiently advert to those facts that 
 " were daily occurring to contradict this theory. 
 " I am now, however, firmly convinced from re- 
 " peated observations, that lime and other cal- 
 " careous manures produce a much greater 
 " proportional improvement upon poor soils, 
 " than such as are richer; And that lime alone 
 '* upon a poor soil, will, in many cases, produce 
 " a much greater and more lasting degree of 
 " fertility than dung alone/ 
 
 " Thus far Mr. Anderson's theory is exactly 
 " conformable to the theory we have laid down, 
 " and what ought to happen according to our 
 *' principles. He mentions, however, some 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 
 
 " facts which seem very strongly to militate 
 " against it, and, indeed, he himself seems to 
 " proceed upon a theory altogether different. 
 
 " Calcareous matters alone (says he) is not 
 " capable of rearing plants to perfection : 
 " mould is necessary to mix with it in certain 
 " proportions, before it can form a proper soil. 
 " It remains, however, to be determined what is 
 " the due proportion of these ingredients for 
 " forming a proper soil. 
 
 " We know that neither chalk, nor marl, nor 
 " lime, can be made to nourish plants alone ; 
 " and soils are sometimes found that abound with 
 " the two first of these to a faulty degree, but 
 " the proportion of calcareous matter in these 
 " is so much larger than could ever be produced 
 " by art, where the soil is naturally destitute of 
 " these substances, that there seems to be no 
 " danger of erring on that side. Probably it 
 " would be much easier to correct the defects of 
 " those soils in which calcareous matters super- 
 " abound, by driving earth upon them as manure, 
 " than is generally imagined; as a very small 
 " proportion of it sometimes affords a very per- 
 " feet soil. I shall illustrate my meaning by a 
 " few examples. 
 
 " Near Sandside, in the county of Caithness, 
 " there is a pretty extensive plain on the sea- 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 205 
 
 " coast, endowed with a most singular degree 
 " of fertility. In all seasons it produces a most 
 " luxuriant herbage, although it never got any 
 " manure since the creation, and has been for 
 " time immemorial subjected to the following 
 " course of crops. 
 
 " 1. Bear after once ploughing, from grass, 
 " usually a good crop. 
 
 " 2. Bear, after once ploughing, a better 
 " crop than the first. 
 
 " 3. Bear, after once ploughing, a crop 
 " equal to the first. 
 
 " 4. 5. and 6. Natural grass, as close and 
 " rich as could be imagined, might be cut if 
 " the possessor so inclined, and would yield an 
 " extraordinary crop of hay each year : after 
 " this the same course of cropping is renewed. 
 
 " The soil that admits of this singular mode 
 " of farming, appears to be a pure incoherent 
 " sand, destitute of the smallest particle of ve- 
 " getable mould ; but upon examination it is 
 " found to consist almost entirely of broken 
 " shells ; the fine mould here bears such a small 
 " proportion to the calcareous matter, as to be 
 " scarcely perceptible, and yet it forms the 
 " most fertile soil that ever I yet met with." 
 
 The writer of this article in the Encyclopae- 
 dia accounts for this fertility, by supposing that 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 
 
 from its vicinity to the sea, it derives its prolific 
 powers from the salt water ; but by adverting to 
 the principles I have laid down, a much more 
 probable arrangement and combination may be 
 suggested. In the first place, we may suppose 
 that the mechanical texture of the soil and sub- 
 soil is such, and so situated, as not only to 
 obtain a supply of fresh water, but to admit of, 
 and facilitate, a constantly ascending and de- 
 scending motion of such water; and that its 
 chemical constitution is such, as to facilitate the 
 decomposition and reduction of the roots, leaves, 
 and stalks of the vegetables, regularly deprived 
 of life, to a soluble state, without the process of 
 putrefaction, and its consequent loss in car- 
 buretted hydrogene gas, &c. 
 
 All calcareous earths may alike possess anti- 
 septic powers, but all do not possess the capa- 
 city of operating so effectually as that here de- 
 scribed, to supply the requisite motion, change, 
 and quantity of water, by percolation and capil- 
 lary attraction, and consequently no other can be 
 equal in its fertility. 
 
 Sir H. Davy has given a minute analysis and 
 description of almost every kind of soil, and 
 explained the means of chemical investigation. 
 But as, I think, what has been said will be sum*, 
 cient to enable every person to form a pretty 
 
ON THE COMPOSITION OF SOILS, &C. 07 
 
 correct judgment of the capacity and constitu- 
 tion of soils, as adapted to the general purposes 
 of husbandry ; I shall not enter more particu- 
 larly on this part of the subject, but must refer 
 those who wish for such information, to his work 
 on agricultural chemistry. 
 
208 
 
 ON HAYMAKING. 
 
 HAVING observed that in a season when there 
 was no rain whatever, and the hay had been 
 made with rapidity, and carted within a short 
 time after it had been cut, that a greater quan- 
 tity was destroyed and injured, by being over- 
 heated and burnt, than in a catching irregular 
 season ; that when hay had not heated in the 
 stack it was frequently mouldy; that as hay lost 
 its native green colour and approached a 
 brown, it lost its nutritive qualities; and that alto- 
 gether, the making of hay, as usually conducted, 
 was a very precarious and teasing operation : I 
 determined on trying to arrange a system on 
 some more regular and certain principles, in 
 which I succeeded ; and by adopting a certain 
 and regular course of operations, was enabled 
 to make my hay of a uniform good quality; and, 
 let the weather be as it might, at a regular ex- 
 pense of labour. And considering such a pro- 
 cess not only of importance, as it ensures a 
 more perfect quality; but as it affords a more 
 certain protection against the injuries usually 
 consequent on the uncertainty of the weather, 
 
ON HAYMAKING. 209 
 
 and overheating in the stack ; and that it thus 
 removes two great causes of anxiety, it may be 
 well worth the public attention. 
 
 In the first place, as to the state of the wea- 
 ther, it generally happens at this season of the 
 year, that there are three or four days rain and 
 three or four days dry; therefore, on beginning 
 to cut the grass, as it is well known that during 
 wet weather grass may be cut, and suffered to 
 remain in the swarth for several days without 
 injury; and it being desirable, where hands are 
 plenty, to have a good quantity, or as much as 
 will complete a stack in a day, in the same 
 state of forwardness ; I should prefer beginning 
 to cut during the rainy weather : however, be 
 this as it may, the swarths should not be opened 
 but on a certain fine day; and when this is 
 done, the grass should be well shaken apart and 
 equally spread over the ground. As soon as the 
 upper surface is dry, turn it well over ; and in 
 this operation, great care should be taken to 
 open and spread any cocks that may not have 
 been divided in the first opening. This being 
 done, commence raking into wind-rows in time, 
 that the whole may be made into small cocks 
 before night. The second day these cocks must 
 remain untouched, let the weather be wet or dry : 
 the third day, if the weather be certain and 
 
210 Otf HAYMAKING. 
 
 fine, throw the cocks open; but if the weather 
 be wet or threatening, they may remain an- 
 other day, or until the weather is certain to be 
 fine for the day. The cocks should then be 
 thrown, according to the crop, into beds of two 
 or three rows; and after three or four hours' ex- 
 posure, turned over ; and taking time to gather 
 the whole into wind-rows and cocks before night, 
 let this operation commence accordingly, and 
 none be left open : the day after this, which in 
 fine weather will be the fourth ; the cocks must 
 again remain untouched, or not be opened, whe- 
 ther the weather be wet or dry. On the fifth, or 
 the next dry day, these cocks will only require 
 to be opened for an hour or two, when they will 
 be fit for the stack. The novelty of this mode 
 consists only in suffering the hay to remain in 
 cock the second and third, or alternate days; 
 and at first sight it may appear that so much 
 time in fine weather must be lost, but this is 
 not the case. Whilst the hay remains in cocks, a 
 slight fermentation, or what is termed sweating, 
 will take place ; and in consequence, after it has 
 been opened on the third and fifth days, it will 
 prove to be just as forward as if it had been 
 worked every day. And the advantages result- 
 ing from this, are obviously the following : by 
 shortening the time of open exposure* the co- 
 
ON HAYMAKING. 211 
 
 lour of the hay is more perfectly preserved, and 
 consequently the quality ; and the ferment- 
 ations, or sweating, which take place in the 
 cocks, prove so much to have diminished that 
 principle, or inclination, as to prevent its heat- 
 ing injuriously in the stack 5 and the whole 
 operation of making, whether it takes four days 
 or eight, requires three days' labour only ; and 
 the hay being left in that state every night, in 
 which it is the least possibly exposed to the in- 
 juries of the weather, and in which it may re- 
 main for a day or two in uncertain weather, 
 without injurious exposure ; much painful anxi- 
 ety, and useless attendance of labourers, are 
 obviated. 
 
ON PLANTING ORCHARDS AND MAKING CIDER, 
 
 By introducing the subject of cider, my ob- 
 ject is not to enter into the history of the apple, 
 nor to discuss the merits of the different modes 
 of making eider, nor to describe the vast variety 
 of cider fruit ; but knowing that certain preju- 
 dices and erroneous opinions exist, that much 
 depreciate the value of that, which, when well 
 made, is a wholesome and delicious liquor ; and 
 that such prejudices and opinions absolutely de- 
 prive many districts of the profit and pleasure, 
 resulting from the growing and making good 
 cider; I entertain the hope of being able to 
 state such observations and facts, as will assist in 
 removing those obstacles. 
 
 In the first place, it is a general opinion that 
 the soil of those districts that are famous for 
 good cider, such as Devonshire, Herefordshire, 
 Somersetshire, &c. is the grand cause of the 
 superiority of their productions ; but this is an 
 egregious error; it is by no means the case: the 
 soil has little effect on the quality of the cider ; 
 as it is well known that in those counties, cele- 
 brated for good cider, the prime ciders are 
 
ON PLANTING ORCHARDS. 
 
 produced on soils of directly opposite qualities. 
 However, to convince my neighbours of Wilt- 
 shire, that the cause of their inferiority was in 
 their bad assortment of apples, and not in their 
 soil or climate ; I, many years since, selected 
 some apples of the sort there called the cad- 
 berry, which grew in a very poor, shallow, 
 black, gravelly soil, resting on a chalk subsoil ; 
 and made cider from them : and this cider 
 proved, and was allowed by many good judges 
 who tasted it, to be as rich, strong, and full- 
 bodied, as any that grew on the richest lands, 
 or most famous districts. I also gathered from 
 one tree of the sort called the golden ducat, 
 growing on a soil of the same description, forty 
 bushels of apples, and these were made into 
 cider, which, like the apple itself, proved to be a 
 brilliant, sparkling, delicious, vinous liquor. In 
 the same orchard the greater part of the apples 
 were of the worst sorts, green, thin and sour ; 
 and when mixed, made a thin sour cider. I 
 also, by way of demonstration, made cider from 
 various other fruits separately, and among the 
 rest, of a green hard apple, called the stone 
 pippin, which being well known to keep well, 
 and after long keeping, to ameliorate and be- 
 come palatable ; I wished to prove if the cider 
 also would improve by keeping : which it did 
 
ON PLANTING ORCHARDS 
 
 not, but was always like the apple, thin and sour- 
 Hence it must be obvious, that as far as the soil 
 is concerned, the same sorts of apples grown in 
 any part of the kingdom, will produce cider of 
 equally good quality; indeed, every person 
 knows that a nonpareil is a nonpareil, and a 
 golden pippin, a golden pippin, in all places 
 alike ; the only difference that can arise in the 
 soil, is in the supply of moisture and manure ; 
 the greater the supply of these the greater may 
 be the quantity ; but the quality will be more 
 aqueous, and of course less valuable. The quality 
 will be chiefly influenced by the climate and 
 exposure, as it may affect the ripening, for the 
 riper and dryer the fruit, the richer and more 
 spirituous the cider ; and these things vary in 
 their effect on apples, as much in one county 
 as another. 
 
 Another very prevailing opinion is, that a 
 good eating apple cannot be a good cider apple ; 
 and that a good cider apple is not to be selected 
 by its taste, or effect on the palate ; but this is 
 equally erroneous. A person may not be able to 
 ascertain the exact specific gravity of the juice 
 of an apple by his palate ; but the general 
 character of an apple may be correctly ascer- 
 tained ; and the character or qualities of the 
 cider, will always be found to prove very nearly 
 
AND MAKING CIDER. 
 
 the same as the apple. Thus, a rough sweet 
 apple will give a rough sweet cider ; a thin sweet 
 apple, a thin sweet cider ; and an acid and sour 
 apple, an acid and sour cider ; but generally, the 
 rough asperity of an apple and the aromatic 
 flavor will remain in the pulp, or pass off in fer- 
 mentation. Another erroneous opinion is also 
 very generally prevalent, that a mixture of 
 apples makes the best cider ; but as a general 
 proposition, a simple view of the thing must 
 show its absurdity. If there be a good cider 
 apple, and a bad cider apple ; how can an union 
 of the bad, make the good better ? The fact 
 is, fermentation possesses the greatest influence 
 in determining the quality of the cider; and it 
 is a law of nature, that without a perfect vinous 
 fermentation, there cannot be a perfect vinous 
 liquor. Now it is well known, that two sorts of 
 apples may be selected, the juice of one of which 
 will commence fermenting in two or three days, 
 and that of the other, not in less than eight or 
 ten days. It must then be obvious, that as the 
 early fermentation of the one, will force the 
 backwardness of the other, and the late fer- 
 menting will check and retard the early, there 
 can be no perfect fermentation with either ; and 
 consequently no perfect vinous liquor : and 
 this principle will undoubtedly operate, with 
 
216 ON PLANTING ORCHARDS 
 
 the fruit from the same tree, as some must 
 unavoidably be better ripened than others ; and 
 therefore, in this case, if the ripest were selected 
 and separately made into cider, the quality 
 would prove superior to that made of those that 
 were less ripe, or if made together. After cider 
 is made, indeed, it may, by mixing, be made 
 more suitable for peculiar, or general purposes, 
 and thus be said to be better for mixing ; but 
 mixing the apples must be a pernicious and un- 
 profitable practice. 
 
 The science of fermentation is most important 
 to all who make cider, or wine, or beer; and 
 those who wish for information on this subject, 
 may find it in a valuable little book, by Mac- 
 cullock on wines. 
 
 The health, duration, and prolificacy of apple- 
 trees, as well as all other fruit-trees, are more 
 dependent upon the subsoil than the surface- 
 soil; in planting trees, therefore, this- requires 
 more attention than is generally given to it 
 Healthy and prolific apple-trees will seldom be 
 found where the subsoil is of a cold, tenacious, 
 wet, and stagnating quality ; and whatever may 
 be the nature of the surface-soil during very dry 
 summers, the roots in search of water will delve 
 deep into the subsoil, and having penetrated, 
 however low, there they must remain ; they 
 
AND MAKING CIDER. 
 
 cannot get back again, In all cases, food se- 
 lected deep in the soil, is aqueous and unwhole- 
 some ; and if the water be stagnant, the roots 
 canker and rot in the winter, which vitiates the 
 sap, and thus the tree becomes cankered and dis- 
 eased; and a tree thus situated, although it may 
 for the few first years produce fine fruit, and 
 afterwards, generally produce strong fine shoots 
 in the summer, these will become diseased, and 
 often die in the winter or spring. The fruit, 
 also, when a tree is in this state, is generally 
 vapid and imperfect, and a crop very un- 
 certain. 
 
 In planting orchards, therefore, it will be 
 necessary, to ensure success, or permanent 
 and progressive prolificacy ; to guard against 
 those casualties, by underdraining and supplying 
 water on the surface, during very dry weather. 
 But the most effectual mode will be, in improper 
 subsoils, to form an artificial rock, as a found- 
 ation on which to plant the trees, about a foot or 
 a foot and a half underneath the surface of the 
 soil, which may be easily done by removing the 
 soil to the required depth, and laying a kind of 
 floor of stones, bricks, tiles, or slates, taking 
 care that the joints be well closed or stopped 
 with cement, that the roots may not penetrate, 
 as a tree extends its roots, even farther than its 
 
 Q 
 
218 ON PLANTING ORCHARDS 
 
 branches. To make the foundation quite per- 
 fect may be expensive, but it must be considered, 
 that the work thus done is for ever done ; it will 
 not require repairing : and the additional proli- 
 ficacy of the trees, their healthy duration, and 
 the superior quality of the fruit, will make an 
 ample return. However, where the expense of 
 paving to a full extent cannot be afforded, even 
 three or four feet square immediately under the 
 tree, will be a great protection : it will, at any 
 rate, give a right direction to the roots in their 
 first outset, and prevent the formation of tap- 
 roots, which are bad things in fruit-trees. 
 
 As the figure of a tree, or its shape and form, 
 determines its powers of sustaining weights on 
 its branches, and of resisting the wind; and its 
 prolificacy, in a great measure, depends on the 
 due and regular expansion and exposure of its 
 branches equally to the influence of the sun 
 and air, this should be attended to on its first 
 formation or grafting. And if the following par- 
 ticulars in the mode of managing it are attended 
 to, they will be found to produce a tree of that 
 shape and strength, that will be equal, in every 
 respect, to its wants. 
 
 Whether the tree be intended to be raised by 
 inserting the graft near the ground, or at a suffi- 
 cient height to form a head ; only one graft 
 
AND MAKING CIDER. 219 
 
 should be permitted to remain ; and this should 
 be trained up, with a single stem, to the utmost 
 height of its growth, and never stop'd or cut 
 back. The horizontal branches or head will then 
 be found to form itself, by pushing out shoots 
 immediately around the point of the year's per- 
 pendicular shoot or stem ; and as this will be 
 long or short, according to the soil and situation, 
 the horizontal tiers of branches will be at pro- 
 portional and proper distances ; and thus the tree 
 will assume the shape and growth of the fir or the 
 wild cherry-tree. If any irregular shoots should 
 push out on the sides of the stem, or too many 
 horizontals, they may be removed. And if the 
 perpendicular stem or leading shoot should be 
 destroyed, one of the horizontals may be fixed 
 up perpendicularly to fill its place, which it will 
 soon do, and the knife will not be required to 
 be used for any other purpose. A tree formed 
 in this manner, will apply all the sap furnished 
 by the roots to a profitable purpose ; and as it 
 will never be headed, or cutback, its progressive 
 or annual increase will be effective. And, as I 
 have before observed, it being a law of nature, 
 that no tree shall bear fruit until it has obtained 
 a surface of stalk, branches, and leaves, propor- 
 tioned to the food it takes up, this law will be 
 fully supported ; and the tree will attain the 
 
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