SECTION VIII.—CONCLUDING OBSERVATIONS.
In this little work, now brought to a close, I have presented the reader with a slight, and I hope plain and familiar, sketch of the various topics connected with practical agriculture, on which the sciences of chemistry and geology are fitted to throw the greatest light.
We have studied the general characters of the organic and inorganic elements of which the parts of plants are made up, and the several compounds of these elements which are of the greatest importance in the vegetable kingdom. We have examined the nature of the seed,—seen by what beautiful provision it is fed during its early germination—in what form the elements by which it is nourished are introduced into the circulation of the young plant when the functions of the seed are discharged,—and how earth, air, and water are all made to minister to its after-growth. We have considered the various chemical changes which take place within the growing plant, during the formation of its woody stem, the blossoming of its flower, and the ripening of its seed or fruit,—and have traced the further changes it undergoes, when, the functions of its short life being discharged, it hastens to serve other purposes, by mingling with the soil, and supplying food to new races. The soils themselves in which plants grow, their nature, their origin, the causes of their diversity in mineral character, and in natural productiveness, have each occupied a share of our attention—while the various means of improving their agricultural value by manuring or otherwise, have been practically considered, and theoretically explained. Lastly, we have glanced at the comparative worth of the various products of the land, as food for man or other animals, and have briefly illustrated the principles upon which the feeding of animals and the relative nutritive powers of the vegetables on which they live are known to depend.
In this short and familiar treatise I have not sought so much to satisfy the demands of the philosophical agriculturist, as to awaken the curiosity of my less instructed reader, to shew him how much interesting as well as practically useful information chemistry and geology are able and willing to impart to him, and thus to allure him in quest of further knowledge and more accurate details to my larger work,[27] of which the present exhibits only a brief outline.
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Footnotes:
[1] Both potatoes and turnips contain about four-fifths of their weight of water, or five tons of either of these roots contain nearly four tons of water.
[2] This is the scale of the common thermometer used in this country.
[3] For fuller information on this point, see the Author’s “Lectures on Agricultural Chemistry and Geology,” Part I.
[4] Since carbonic acid, as shewn in the previous chapter, consists only of carbon and oxygen, they retain the carbon and reject the oxygen.
[5] In malting barley, it is made to sprout a certain length, and the growth is then arrested by heating and drying it. Mashed barley, before sprouting, will not dissolve in water, but when sprouted, the whole of the starch (the flour) it contains dissolves readily by a gentle heat. The diastase formed during the germination effects this. By further heating in the brewer’s wort, this starch is converted into sugar as it is in the growing plant.
[6] For fuller and more precise explanations on these interesting topics, see the Author’s Lectures on Agricultural Chemistry and Geology, Part I.
[7] Potash, soda, lime, and magnesia, are compounds of the metals here named with oxygen. It is a very striking fact, that the suffocating gas chlorine, when combined with sodium, a metal which takes fire when placed upon water, should form the agreeable and necessary condiment, common salt.
[8] And occasionally do give; for a plump grain, and even a well-filled ear, are not unfrequently found where the straw is unusually deficient.
[9] [See pages 51 and 52], where these substances are described.
[10] A further portion, it will be recollected, is carried off in the cattle that are sent to market,—this is here neglected.
[11] Unless the soil happen to contain a large quantity of magnesia, which is rarely the case.
[12] That is, containing the same general proportions of sand, clay, lime, &c., or coloured red by similar quantities of oxide of iron.
[14] The unstratified are often called crystalline rocks, because they frequently have a glassy appearance, or contain regular crystals of certain mineral substances; often also igneous rocks, because they appear all to have been originally in a melted state, or to have been produced by fire.
[15] The reader is referred for more precise information to the author’s “Lectures,” pp. 377 to 390.
[16] By locally excellent, I mean those who are the best possible farmers of their own district and after their own way, but who would fail in other districts requiring other methods. To the possessor of agricultural principles the modifications required by difference of crop, soil, and climate, readily suggest themselves, where the mere practical man is bewildered, disheartened, and in despair.
[17] It is owing to this large quantity of saline and other inorganic matter that fermented leaves form too strong a dressing for flower borders, and that gardeners therefore generally mix them up into a compost.
[18] Though I have dwelt as long upon these interesting and, I believe, novel considerations, as the limits of this little work will permit, yet I must refer the reader for fuller details, and to perhaps a clearer exposition of the principles above advanced than I have here been able to give, to my “Lectures on Agricultural Chemistry and Geology.”
[19] See the author’s “Suggestions for Experiments in Practical Agriculture,” Nos. 1 & 2.
[20] The result of trials made on the mica slate and gneiss soils (see page 100) of the Duke of Atholl.
[22] Albumen is the name given by chemists to the white of the egg. A small quantity of this substance is present in every kind of grain. It is closely related to gluten.
[23] On this subject the reader will consult with advantage an excellent practical paper in the Quarterly Journal of Agriculture for June 1841, by Mr. Hannam of North Deighton, Yorkshire, to whom I have to express my obligations for information regarding the results of some further experiments made by him during the last autumn (1841).
[24] The flour being supposed to contain 15 per cent. of dry gluten, on which supposition all the above calculations are made.
[25] In warm weather the milk contains more butter, in cold weather more cheese and sugar.
[26] Both cut in flower.
[27] Lectures on Agricultural Chemistry and Geology.
Transcriber’s Notes:
The cover image was created by the transcriber, and is in the public domain.
Deprecated spellings or ancient words were not corrected.
The illustrations have been moved so that they do not break up paragraphs and so that they are next to the text they illustrate.
Typographical and punctuation errors have been silently corrected.