Familiar Letters on Chemistry Part 9

Is the supply of nitrogen in the excrements of animals quite a matter of indifference, or do we receive back from our fields a quant.i.ty of the elements of blood corresponding to this supply?

The researches of Boussingault have solved this problem in the most satisfactory manner. If, in his grand experiments, the manure which he gave to his fields was in the same state, i.e. dried at 110 deg in a vacuum, as it was when a.n.a.lysed, these fields received, in 16 years, 1,300 pounds of nitrogen. But we know that by drying all the nitrogen escapes which is contained in solid animal excrements, as volatile carbonate of ammonia. In this calculation the nitrogen of the urine, which by decomposition is converted into carbonate of ammonia, has not been included. If we suppose it amounted to half as much as that in the dried excrements, this would make the quant.i.ty of nitrogen supplied to the fields 1,950 pounds.

In 16 years, however, as we have seen, only 1,517 pounds of nitrogen, was contained in their produce of grain, straw, roots, et cetera--that is, far less than was supplied in the manure; and in the same period the same extent of surface of good meadow-land (one hectare = a Hessian morgen), which received no nitrogen in manure, 2,062 pounds of nitrogen.

It is well known that in Egypt, from the deficiency of wood, the excrement of animals is dried, and forms the princ.i.p.al fuel, and that the nitrogen from the soot of this excrement was, for many centuries, imported into Europe in the form of sal ammoniac, until a method of manufacturing this substance was discovered at the end of the last century by Gravenhorst of Brunswick. The fields in the delta of the Nile are supplied with no other animal manures than the ashes of the burnt excrements, and yet they have been proverbially fertile from a period earlier than the first dawn of history, and that fertility continues to the present day as admirable as it was in the earliest times. These fields receive, every year, from the inundation of the Nile, a new soil, in its mud deposited over their surface, rich in those mineral elements which have been withdrawn by the crops of the previous harvest. The mud of the Nile contains as little nitrogen as the mud derived from the Alps of Switzerland, which fertilises our fields after the inundations of the Rhine. If this fertilising mud owed this property to nitrogenised matters; what enormous beds of animal and vegetable exuviae and remains ought to exist in the mountains of Africa, in heights extending beyond the limits of perpetual snow, where no bird, no animal finds food, from the absence of all vegetation!

Abundant evidence in support of the important truth we are discussing, may be derived from other well known facts. Thus, the trade of Holland in cheese may be adduced in proof and ill.u.s.tration thereof. We know that cheese is derived from the plants which serve as food for cows. The meadow-lands of Holland derive the nitrogen of cheese from the same source as with us; i.e. the atmosphere. The milch cows of Holland remain day and night on the grazing-grounds, and therefore, in their fluid and solid excrements return directly to the soil all the salts and earthy elements of their food: a very insignificant quant.i.ty only is exported in the cheese. The fertility of these meadows can, therefore, be as little impaired as our own fields, to which we restore all the elements of the soil, as manure, which have been withdrawn in the crops. The only difference is, in Holland they remain on the field, whilst we collect them at home and carry them, from time to time, to the fields.

The nitrogen of the fluid and solid excrements of cows, is derived from the meadow-plants, which receive it from the atmosphere; the nitrogen of the cheese also must be drawn from the same source. The meadows of Holland have, in the lapse of centuries, produced millions of hundredweights of cheese. Thousands of hundredweights are annually exported, and yet the productiveness of the meadows is in no way diminished, although they never receive more nitrogen than they originally contained.

Nothing then can be more certain than the fact, that an exportation of nitrogenised products does not exhaust the fertility of a country; inasmuch as it is not the soil, but the atmosphere, which furnishes its vegetation with nitrogen. It follows, consequently, that we cannot increase the fertility of our fields by a supply of nitrogenised manure, or by salts of ammonia, but rather that their produce increases or diminishes, in a direct ratio, with the supply of mineral elements capable of a.s.similation. The formation of the const.i.tuent elements of blood, that is, of the nitrogenised principles in our cultivated plants, depends upon the presence of inorganic matters in the soil, without which no nitrogen can be a.s.similated even when there is a most abundant supply. The ammonia contained in animal excrements exercises a favourable effect, inasmuch as it is accompanied by the other substances necessary to accomplish its transition into the elements of the blood. If we supply ammonia a.s.sociated with all the conditions necessary to its a.s.similation, it ministers to the nourishment of the plants; but if this artificial supply is not given they can derive all the needed nitrogen from the atmosphere--a source, every loss from which is restored by the decomposition of the bodies of dead animals and the decay of plants. Ammonia certainly favours, and accelerates, the growth of plants in all soils, wherein all the conditions of its a.s.similation are united; but it is altogether without effect, as respects the production of the elements of blood where any of these conditions are wanting. We can suppose that asparagin, the active const.i.tuent of asparagus, the mucilaginous root of the marsh-mallow, the nitrogenised and sulphurous ingredients of mustard-seed, and of all cruciferous plants, may originate without the aid of the mineral elements of the soil. But if the principles of those vegetables, which serve as food, could be generated without the co-operation of the mineral elements of blood, without potash, soda, phosphate of soda, phosphate of lime, they would be useless to us and to herbivorous animals as food; they would not fulfil the purpose for which the wisdom of the Creator has destined them. In the absence of alkalies and the phosphates, no blood, no milk, no muscular fibre can be formed. Without phosphate of lime our horses, sheep and cattle, would be without bones.

In the urine and in the solid excrements of animals we carry ammonia, and, consequently, nitrogen, to our cultivated plants, and this nitrogen is accompanied by all the mineral elements of food exactly in the same proportions, in which both are contained in the plants which served as food to the animals, or what is the same, in those proportions in which both can serve as nourishment to a new generation of plants, to which both are essential.

The effect of an artificial supply of ammonia, as a source of nitrogen, is, therefore, precisely a.n.a.logous to that of humus as a source of carbonic acid--it is limited to a gain of time; that is, it accelerates the development of plants. This is of great importance, and should always be taken into account in gardening, especially in the treatment of the kitchen-garden; and as much as possible, in agriculture on a large scale, where the time occupied in the growth of the plants cultivated is of importance.

When we have exactly ascertained the quant.i.ty of ashes left after the combustion of cultivated plants which have grown upon all varieties of soil, and have obtained correct a.n.a.lyses of these ashes, we shall learn with certainty which of the const.i.tuent elements of the plants are constant and which are changeable, and we shall arrive at an exact knowledge of the sum of all the ingredients we withdraw from the soil in the different crops.

With this knowledge the farmer will be able to keep an exact record, of the produce of his fields in harvest, like the account-book of a well regulated manufactory; and then by a simple calculation he can determine precisely the substances he must supply to each field, and the quant.i.ty of these, in order to restore their fertility. He will be able to express, in pounds weight, how much of this or that element he must give in order to augment its fertility for any given kind of plants.

These researches and experiments are the great desideratum of the present time. TO THE UNITED EFFORTS OF THE CHEMISTS OF ALL COUNTRIES WE MAY CONFIDENTLY LOOK FOR A SOLUTION OF THESE GREAT QUESTIONS, and by the aid of ENLIGHTENED AGRICULTURISTS we shall arrive at a RATIONAL system of GARDENING, HORTICULTURE, and AGRICULTURE, applicable to every country and all kinds of soil, and which will be based upon the immutable foundation of OBSERVED FACTS and PHILOSOPHICAL INDUCTION.

LETTER XVI

My dear Sir,

My recent researches into the const.i.tuent ingredients of our cultivated fields have led me to the conclusion that, of all the elements furnished to plants by the soil and ministering to their nourishment, the phosphate of lime--or, rather, the phosphates generally--must be regarded as the most important.

In order to furnish you with a clear idea of the importance of the phosphates, it may be sufficient to remind you of the fact, that the blood of man and animals, besides common salt, always contains alkaline and earthy phosphates. If we burn blood and examine the ashes which remain, we find certain parts of them soluble in water, and others insoluble. The soluble parts are, common salt and alkaline phosphates; the insoluble consist of phosphate of lime, phosphate of magnesia, and oxide of iron.

These mineral ingredients of the blood--without the presence of which in the food the formation of blood is impossible--both man and animals derive either immediately, or mediately through other animals, from vegetable substances used as food; they had been const.i.tuents of vegetables, they had been parts of the soil upon which the vegetable substances were developed.

If we compare the amount of the phosphates in different vegetable substances with each other, we discover a great variety, whilst there is scarcely any ashes of plants altogether devoid of them, and those parts of plants which experience has taught us are the most nutritious, contain the largest proportion. To these belong all seeds and grain, especially the varieties of bread-corn, peas, beans, and lentils.

It is a most curious fact that if we incinerate grain or its flour, peas, beans, and lentils, we obtain ashes, which are distinguished from the ashes of all other parts of vegetables by the absence of alkaline carbonates. The ashes of these seeds when recently prepared, do not effervesce with acids; their soluble ingredients consist solely of alkaline phosphates, the insoluble parts of phosphate of lime, phosphate of magnesia, and oxide of iron: consequently, of the very same salts which are contained in blood, and which are absolutely indispensable to its formation. We are thus brought to the further indisputable conclusion that no seed suitable to become food for man and animals can be formed in any plant without the presence and co-operation of the phosphates. A field in which phosphate of lime, or the alkaline phosphates, form no part of the soil, is totally incapable of producing grain, peas, or beans.

An enormous quant.i.ty of these substances indispensable to the nourishment of plants, is annually withdrawn from the soil and carried into great towns, in the shape of flour, cattle, et cetera.

It is certain that this incessant removal of the phosphates must tend to exhaust the land and diminish its capability of producing grain. The fields of Great Britain are in a state of progressive exhaustion from this cause, as is proved by the rapid extension of the cultivation of turnips and mangel wurzel--plants which contain the least amount of the phosphates, and therefore require the smallest quant.i.ty for their development. These roots contain 80 to 92 per cent. of water. Their great bulk makes the amount of produce fallacious, as respects their adaptation to the food of animals, inasmuch as their contents of the ingredients of the blood, i.e. of substances which can be transformed into flesh, stands in a direct ratio to their amount of phosphates, without which neither blood nor flesh can be formed.

Our fields will become more and more deficient in these essential ingredients of food, in all localities where custom and habits do not admit the collection of the fluid and solid excrements of man, and their application to the purposes of agriculture. In a former letter I showed you how great a waste of phosphates is unavoidable in England, and referred to the well-known fact that the importation of bones restored in a most admirable manner the fertility of the fields exhausted from this cause. In the year 1827 the importation of bones for manure amounted to 40,000 tons, and Huskisson estimated their value to be from L 100,000 to L 200,000 sterling. The importation is still greater at present, but it is far from being sufficient to supply the waste.

Another proof of the efficacy of the phosphates in restoring fertility to exhausted land is afforded by the use of the guano--a manure which, although of recent introduction into England, has found such general and extensive application.

We believe that the importation of one hundred-weight of guano is equivalent to the importation of eight hundred-weight of wheat--the hundred-weight of guano a.s.sumes in a time which can be accurately estimated the form of a quant.i.ty of food corresponding to eight hundred-weight of wheat. The same estimate is applicable in the valuation of bones.

If it were possible to restore to the soil of England and Scotland the phosphates which during the last fifty years have been carried to the sea by the Thames and the Clyde, it would be equivalent to manuring with millions of hundred-weights of bones, and the produce of the land would increase one-third, or perhaps double itself, in five to ten years.

We cannot doubt that the same result would follow if the price of the guano admitted the application of a quant.i.ty to the surface of the fields, containing as much of the phosphates as have been withdrawn from them in the same period.

If a rich and cheap source of phosphate of lime and the alkaline phosphates were open to England, there can be no question that the importation of foreign corn might be altogether dispensed with after a short time. For these materials England is at present dependent upon foreign countries, and the high price of guano and of bones prevents their general application, and in sufficient quant.i.ty.

Every year the trade in these substances must decrease, or their price will rise as the demand for them increases.

According to these premises, it cannot be disputed, that the annual expense of Great Britain for the importation of bones and guano is equivalent to a duty on corn: with this difference only, that the amount is paid to foreigners in money.

To restore the disturbed equilibrium of const.i.tution of the soil,--to fertilise her fields,--England requires an enormous supply of animal excrements, and it must, therefore, excite considerable interest to learn, that she possesses beneath her soil beds of fossil guano, strata of animal excrements, in a state which will probably allow of their being employed as a manure at a very small expense. The coprolithes discovered by Dr. Buckland, (a discovery of the highest interest to Geology,) are these excrements; and it seems extremely probable that in these strata England possesses the means of supplying the place of recent bones, and therefore the princ.i.p.al conditions of improving agriculture--of restoring and exalting the fertility of her fields.

In the autumn of 1842, Dr. Buckland pointed out to me a bed of coprolithes in the neighbourhood of Clifton, from half to one foot thick, inclosed in a limestone formation, extending as a brown stripe in the rocks, for miles along the banks of the Severn. The limestone marl of Lyme Regis consists, for the most part, of one-fourth part of fossil excrements and bones. The same are abundant in the lias of Bath, Eastern and Broadway Hill, near Evesham. Dr. Buckland mentions beds, several miles in extent, the substance of which consists, in many places, of a fourth part of coprolithes.

Pieces of the limestone rock in Clifton, near Bristol, which is rich in coprolithes and organic remains, fragments of bones, teeth, &c., were subjected to a.n.a.lysis, and were found to contain above 18 per cent. of phosphate of lime. If this limestone is burned and brought in that state to the fields, it must be a perfect subst.i.tute for bones, the efficacy of which as a manure does not depend, as has been generally, but erroneously supposed, upon the nitrogenised matter which they contain, but on their phosphate of lime.

The osseous breccia found in many parts of England deserves especial attention, as it is highly probable that in a short time it will become an important article of commerce.

What a curious and interesting subject for contemplation! In the remains of an extinct animal world, England is to find the means of increasing her wealth in agricultural produce, as she has already found the great support of her manufacturing industry in fossil fuel,--the preserved matter of primeval forests,--the remains of a vegetable world. May this expectation be realised! and may her excellent population be thus redeemed from poverty and misery!