← catalogue

The Story of the Soil; from the Basis of Absolute Science and Real Life

by Cyril G. Hopkins · English · Gutenberg #4527 · 563,125 chars · public domain (US)

The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Story of the Soil; from the Basis of Absolute Science and Real Life
    
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: The Story of the Soil; from the Basis of Absolute Science and Real Life

Author: Cyril G. Hopkins


        
Release date: October 1, 2003 [eBook #4527]
                Most recently updated: December 28, 2020

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/4527

Credits: This etext was produced by Steve Solomon (ssolomon@soilandhealth.org).


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF THE SOIL; FROM THE BASIS OF ABSOLUTE SCIENCE AND REAL LIFE ***
Ver.10/04/01*END*





This etext was produced by Steve Solomon (ssolomon@soilandhealth.org).




THE STORY OF THE SOIL

From the Basis Of Absolute Science and Real Life

BY CYRIL G. HOPKINS

Author of "Soil Fertility and Permanent Agriculture"

BOSTON

1911






TO MY WIFE






PREFACE





Truth is better than fiction; and this true story of the soil is
written in co-operation with the Press of America and in competition
with popular fiction.

The scenes described exist; the references given can all be found
and verified; and the data quoted are exact, although some of the
story dates antedate the scientific data.

As a rule the names employed are substitutes, but the general
localities are as specified.

If the Story of the Soil should ever fall into the hands of any
individual who suspects that he has contributed to its information,
the author begs that he will accept as belonging to himself every
gracious attribute and take it for granted that anything of opposite
savor was due to autosuggestion.

CYRIL G. HOPKINS.

University of Illinois, Urbana.






CHAPTER I

THE OLD SOUTH





PERCY JOHNSTON stood waiting on the broad veranda of an old-style
Southern home, on a bright November day in 1903. He had just come
from Blue Mound Station, three miles away, with suit-case in hand.

"Would it be possible for me to secure room and board here for a few
days?" he inquired of the elderly woman who answered his knock.

"Would it be possible?" she repeated, apparently asking herself the
question, while she scanned the face of her visitor with kindly eyes
that seemed to look beneath the surface.

"I beg your pardon, my name is Johnston,--Percy Johnston--" he said
with some embarrassment and hesitation, realizing from her speech
and manner that he was not addressing a servant.

"No pardon is needed for that name," she interrupted; "Johnston is a
name we're mighty proud of here in the South."

"But I am from the West," he said.

"We're proud of the West, too; and you should feel right welcome
here, for this is 'Westover,'" waving her hand toward the inroad
fields surrounding the old mansion house. "I am Mrs. West, or at
least I used to be. Perhaps the title better belongs to my son's
wife at the present time; while I am mother, grandma, and
great-grandmother.

"Yes, Sir, you will be very welcome to share our home for a few days
if you wish; and we'll take you as a boarder. We used to entertain
my husband's friends from Richmond,--and from Washington, too,
before the sixties; but since then we have grown poor, and of late
years we take some summer boarders. They have all returned to the
city, however, the last of them having left only yesterday; so you
can have as many rooms as you like.

"Adelaide!" she called.

A rugged girl of seventeen entered the hall from a rear room.

"This is my granddaughter, Adelaide, Mr. Johnston."

Percy looked into her eyes for an instant; then her lashes dropped.
He remembered afterward that they were like her grandmother's, and
he found himself repeating, "The eye is the window of the soul."

"My Dear, will you ask Wilkes to show Mr. Johnston to the southwest
room, and to put a fire in the grate and warm water in the pitcher?"

"Thank you, that will not be necessary," said Percy. "I wish to see
and learn as much as possible of the country hereabout, and
particularly of the farm lands; and, if I may leave my suit-case to
be sent to my room when convenient, I shall take a walk,--perhaps a
long walk. When should I be back to supper."

"At six or half past. My son Charles has gone to Montplain, but he
will be home for dinner. He knows the lands all about here and will
be glad, I am sure, to give you any information possible."

With rapid strides Percy followed the private lane to the open
fields of Westover.

"Is he a cowboy, Grandma?" asked Adelaide, in a tone which did not
suggest a very high regard for cowboys. "Anyway," she continued,
detecting a shade of disapproval in the grandmother's face, "he has
a cowboy's hat, but he doesn't wear buckskin trousers or spurs."

Percy's hat was a relic of college life. Two years before he had
completed the agricultural course at one of the state universities
in the corn belt. Somewhat above the average in size, well
proportioned, accustomed to the heaviest farm work, and trained in
football at college, he was a sturdy young giant,--" strong as an ox
and quick as lightning," in the exaggerated language of his football
admirers






CHAPTER II

FORTY ACRES IN THE CORN BELT





PERCY JOHNSTON'S grandfather had gone west from "York State" and
secured from the federal government a 160-acre "Claim" of the rich
corn belt land. His father had received through inheritance only 40
acres of this; and, marrying his choice from the choir of the local
Lutheran congregation, he had farmed his forty and an adjoining
eighty acres, "rented on shares," for only three years, when he was
taken with pneumonia from exposure and overwork, and died within a
week.

Percy was scarcely a year old when his father was laid in the grave;
but to the sorrowing mother he was all that life held dear.
Existence seemed possible to her only because she could bestow upon
him her double affection, and because the double duties which she
took upon herself completely occupied her time.

She was not in immediate financial need, for her husband had been
able to put some money in the bank during the last year, after
having paid for his "outfit;" the forty-acre farm was free from
debt, but under the law it must remain the joint property of mother
and child for twenty years.

Wisely or unwisely she rejected every opportunity presented that
would have given Percy a stepfather. As daughter and wife she had
learned much of the art of agriculture, and, after some consultation
with a neighbor who seemed to be successful, she made her own plans.

In her make up, sentiment was balanced with sense. Even as a young
wife she had sometimes driven the mower or the self-binder to
"help-out," and she had found pleasure and health in such hours of
out-door life. "I can work and not overwork," she said to her
friends; and in any case the crops seemed to grow better under the
eye of the mistress.

Some years she employed a neighbor boy or girl, and always hired
such other help as she needed. Prices were sometimes low and crops
were not always good; and only widowed mothers can know the full
story of her labor, love and sacrifice. With Percy's help he was
sent to school and finally to the university, choosing for himself
the agricultural college, much to the surprise and disappointment of
his devoted mother.

"Why," she asked, "why should my son go to college to study
agriculture? Have you not studied farming in the practical school of
experience all your life? Surely we have done as much as could be
done on our own little farm; and you have also had the benefit of
the longer experience of our best farmers hereabout, and of the
accumulated wisdom of our ancestors. Oh, I had hoped and truly
believed that you would become interested in engineering, or in
medicine, or may be in the law. I cannot understand why you should
think of going to college to study farming. Surely you already know
more than the college professors do about agriculture."

Percy's mother had too much good sense to have raised a spoiled boy.
He had been taught to work and to think for himself. She loved her
boy far better than her own life,--loved as only a widowed mother
can who has risked her life for him, and who has given to him all
her thought and all her energy from the best twenty years of her own
life; but she had never let herself enjoy that kind of selfishness
which prompts a mother to do for her child what he should be taught
to do for himself. Despite his natural love of sport and the severe
trials he had often brought to her patience and perseverance during
his boyhood days, he had reached a development with the advance of
youth that satisfied her high ideal. His love and appreciation and
tender care for her repaid her every day, she told herself, for all
the years of watching, working, waiting. Never before had he
withstood her positive wish and final judgment.

And yet it was she who had told him that he alone must choose his
life work and his college course in preparation for that work; but,
after the years of toil, she had not dreamed that he would choose
the farm life.

"My darling boy," she continued, "it leads to nothing. This little
farm is poorer to-day than it was when your dear father and I came
here to live and labor. To be sure, the lower field still grows as
good or better crops than ever; but I can remember when that field
was so wet and swampy that it could not be cultivated, and it was in
the work of ditching and tiling that field," she sobbed, "that your
father took the sickness that caused his death."

Tears were in Percy's eyes as he put his arm about his mother and
wiped her tears away.

"But I must tell you what I know to be the truth," she went on
quickly. "The older fields that your grandfather cultivated are less
productive now than when he received them from our generous
government. Indeed, it was your father's plan to continue to farm
here only for a few years longer until he could save enough to
enable him, with what we could have gotten from the sale of our own
forty, to go farther west and purchase a large farm of virgin soil.
He realized, my Son, that even that part of his father's farm that
was first put under cultivation was becoming distinctly reduced in
productiveness. He remembered, too, the stories often repeated by
your grandfather of the run-down condition of the once exceedingly
fertile soils of the Mohawk Valley and other parts of New York
State.

"And you know, Percy, there were many Dutch farmers settled in New
York. They were probably the best farmers among all who came to
America from the Old World. I have heard your grandfather explain
their use of crop rotation, and they understood well the value of
clover and farm fertilizers. But with all of their skill and
knowledge, the land grew poor, and now the very farm upon which
Grandpa was born is not worth as much as the actual cost of the farm
buildings. I hope you will consider all of this. The farm life is so
unpromising for you, and there are such great opportunities for
success in other lines. Still I feel that you must decide this
question for yourself my Son, but tell me why you would choose the
life and work of a farmer?"






CHAPTER III

LINCOLN S VIEW OF AGRICULTURE





PERCY had listened without interrupting, grieved at her
disappointment, and open to any reasoning that might change his
mind.

"Mother dearest," he said, "it was a year ago that you said I would
have only till this fail to decide upon my college course and that
it should be a special preparation for my life work. I have given
much thought to it. You said that I should choose for myself, and I
have not consulted much with others, but I have tried to consider
the matter from different points of view.

"You know the Christmas present you gave me of the Lincoln books?"

"Yes, I know, and you have read them so much. I could not get you
many books, but I knew there could be nothing better for my boy to
read than the thoughts of that noble man. But, Percy dear, Lincoln
was a lawyer, and he rose from the lowest walk in life to the
highest position in the country, and with much less preparation than
my own boy will have. Suppose he had remained a farmer! Surely no
such success could ever have been reached. I am not so foolish as to
have any such high hopes for you. Percy; but if you can only put
yourself in the way of opportunity; and make such preparation as you
can to fill with credit some position of responsibility that may be
offered you! I had truly hoped that your study of Lincoln's life
would influence yours. To me Lincoln was the noblest of all the
noble men of our history, and I doubt not of all history, save Him
who came to redeem the world."

Percy stepped to his little homemade bookcase and took a volume from
the Lincoln set.

"May I read you some words of Lincoln?" he asked.

"Oh yes," she answered wonderingly.

"On September 30th, 1859," said Percy, "Lincoln gave an address at
Milwaukee, before the State Agricultural Society of Wisconsin, and
of all the addresses of Lincoln it seems to me that this is the
greatest, because it deals with the greatest material problem of the
United States. I think I have scarcely heard a public address in
which the speaker has not dwelt upon the fact that the farmer must
feed and clothe the world; and it seems to me that the missionaries
always speak of the famines and starvation of so many people in
India and other old countries. Do you remember the lecture by the
medical missionary? Well, would it not he better to send
agricultural missionaries to India and China to teach those people
how to raise crops?

"I have read and reread this address more than any other in the
Lincoln set. Let me read you some of the paragraphs I have marked.

"After making some introductory remarks about the value of
agricultural fairs, Lincoln began his address as follows:

"'I presume I am not expected to employ the time assigned me in the
mere flattery of the farmers as a class. My opinion of them is that,
in proportion to numbers, they are neither better nor worse than
other people. In the nature of things they are more numerous than
any other class; and I believe there are really more attempts at
flattering them than any other, the reason of which I cannot
perceive, unless it be that they can cast more votes than any other.
On reflection, I am not quite sure that there is not cause of
suspicion against you in selecting me, in some sort a politician and
in no sort a farmer, to address you.

"'But farmers being the most numerous class, it follows that their
interest is the largest interest. It also follows that that interest
is most worthy of all to be cherished and cultivated--that if there
be inevitable conflict between that interest and any other, that
other should yield.

"'Again, I suppose that it is not expected of me to impart to you
much specific information on agriculture. You have no reason to
believe, and do not believe, that I possess it; if that were what
you seek in this address, any one of your own number or class would
be more able to furnish it. You, perhaps, do expect me to give some
general interest to the occasion, and to make some general
suggestions on practical matters. I shall attempt nothing more. And
in such suggestions by me, quite likely very little will be new to
you, and a large part of the rest will be possibly already known to
be erroneous.

"'My first suggestion is an inquiry as to the effect of greater
thoroughness in all the departments of agriculture than now prevails
in the Northwest--perhaps I might say in America. To speak entirely
within bounds, it is known that fifty bushels of wheat, or one
hundred bushels of Indian corn, can be produced from an acre.'"

Percy paused: "You know, Mother, that our corn has averaged some
less than fifty bushels per acre for the last five years, and, as
you say, the lower field has been much better than the old land, and
I think you are quite right in your belief that as an average the
land is growing poorer, although we cultivate better than we used to
do, and our seed corn is of the best variety and saved with much
care. But let me read further:

"'Less than a year ago I saw it stated that a man, by extraordinary
care and labor, had produced of wheat what was equal to two hundred
bushels from an acre. But take fifty of wheat, and one hundred of
corn, to be the possibility, and compare it with the actual crops of
the country. Many years ago I saw it stated, in a patent office
report, that eighteen bushels was the average crop throughout the
United States; and this year an intelligent farmer of Illinois
assured me that he did not believe the land harvested in that State
this season had yielded more than an average of eight bushels to the
acre; much was cut, and then abandoned as not worth threshing, and
much was abandoned as not worth cutting."'

"I know it is true," said the mother, "that wheat was once very much
grown in Central and Northern Illinois, but 1859 must have been an
unusually poor year, for it was grown for twenty years after that,
although it finally failed so completely that its cultivation has
been practically abandoned in those sections for nearly twenty
years. However, the chinch bugs were a very important factor in
discouraging wheat growing and the land has been very good for corn,
especially since the tile-drainage was put in; but on the whole is
it not as I told you?"

"But note these statements," said Percy, turning again to the book:

"'It is true that heretofore we have had better crops with no better
cultivation, but I believe that it is also true that the soil has
never been pushed up to one-half of its capacity.

"'What would be the effect upon the farming interest to push the
soil up to something near its full capacity?'"

"But what can he mean," said the mother. "How can anyone do better
than we have done? We change our crops, and sow clover with the
oats, and return as much as we can to the land. But let me hear
further what Lincoln said:"

"Yes, Mother, this is what he said:

"'Unquestionably it will take more labor to produce fifty bushels of
wheat from an acre than it will to produce ten bushels from the same
acre; but will it take more labor to produce fifty bushels from one
acre than from five? Unquestionably thorough cultivation will
require more labor to the acre; but will it require more to the
bushel? If it should require just as much to the bushel, there are
some probable, and several certain, advantages in favor of the
thorough practice. It is probable it would develop those unknown
causes which of late years have cut down our crops below their
former average. It is almost certain, I think, that by deeper
plowing, analysis of the soils, experiments with manures and
varieties of seeds, observance of seasons, and the like, these
causes would be discovered and remedied. It is certain that thorough
cultivation would spare half, or more than half, the cost of land,
simply because the same produce would be got from half, or from less
than half, the quantity of land. This proposition is self-evident,
and can be made no plainer by repetitions or illustrations. The cost
of land is a great item, even in new countries, and it constantly
grows greater and greater, in comparison with other items, as the
country grows older.'"

Percy paused and said: "If I understand correctly these words of
Lincoln, the land need not become poor. But I do not know why land
becomes poor. I do not know what the soil contains, nor do I know
what corn is made of. We plow the ground and plant the seed and
cultivate and harvest the crop, but I do not know what the corn
crop, or any crop, takes from the soil. I want to learn how to
analyze the soil and crop and to find out, if possible, why soils
become poor, in order, as Lincoln suggests, that the cause may be
discovered and remedied."

"It may be that the college professors could teach you in that way,"
said the mother, "but you know the farm life is so full of work and
so empty of mental culture."

"I used to think so too," said Percy, "but I fear we have worked too
much with our hands and too little with our minds; that we have done
much work in blindness as to the actual causes that control our crop
yields; and that we have not found the mental culture that may be
found in the farm life. Let me read again. These are Lincolns words:

"'No other human occupation opens so wide a field for the profitable
and agreeable combination of labor with cultivated thought, as
agriculture. I know nothing so pleasant to the mind as the discovery
of anything that is at once new and valuable--nothing that so
lightens and sweetens toil as the hopeful pursuit of such discovery.
And how vast and how varied a field is agriculture for such
discovery! The mind, already trained to thought in the country
school, or higher school, cannot fail to find there an exhaustless
source of enjoyment. Every blade of grass is a study; and to produce
two where there was but one is both a profit and a pleasure. And not
grass alone. but soils, seeds, and seasons--hedges, ditches, and
fences--draining, droughts, and irrigation--plowing, hoeing, and
harrowing--reaping, mowing, and threshing--saving crops, pests of
crops, diseases of crops, and what will prevent or cure
them--implements, utensils, and machines, their relative merits, and
how to improve them--hogs, horses, and cattle--sheep, goats and
poultry--trees, shrubs, fruits, plants, and flowers--the thousand
things of which these are specimens--each a world of study within
itself.

"'In all this book learning is available. A capacity and taste for
reading gives access to whatever has already been discovered by
others. It is the key, or one of the keys, to the already solved
problems. And not only so; it gives a relish and facility for
successfully pursuing the unsolved ones. The rudiments of science
are available, and highly available. Some knowledge of botany
assists in dealing with the vegetable world--with all growing crops.
Chemistry assists in the analysis of soils, selection and
application of manures, and in numerous other ways. The mechanical
branches of natural philosophy are ready help in almost everything,
but especially in reference to implements and machinery.

"'The thought recurs that education--cultivated thought--can best be
combined with agricultural labor, on the principle of thorough work;
that careless, half-performed, slovenly work makes no place for such
combination; and thorough work, again, renders sufficient the
smallest quantity of ground to each man; and this, again, conforms
to what must occur in a world less inclined to wars and more devoted
to the arts of peace than heretofore. Population must increase
rapidly, more rapidly than in former times, and ere long the most
valuable of all arts will be the art of deriving a comfortable
subsistence from the smallest area of soil. No community whose every
member possesses this art, can ever be the victim of oppression in
any of its forms. Such community will be alike independent of
crowned kings, money kings, and land kings.'"






CHAPTER IV

LIFE'S CHOICE





PERCY read these words as though they were his own; and perhaps we
may say they were his own, for, as Emerson says: "Thought is the
property of him who can entertain it."

The mother listened, first with wonder; then with deepened interest,
which changed to admiration for the language and for her son, who
seemed to be filled with the spirit which had led Lincoln to see the
problems and the possibilities of the farm life in a light that was
wholly new.

"Surely those are noble thoughts," she said, "from a noble and wise
man. I shall only hope that you will find some opportunity to make
the best possible of your life. We have such a small farm, and the
land hereabout is all so high in price that to enlarge the farm
seems almost hopeless. In part because of this difficulty it had
seemed to me that greater opportunities might be open for you in
other lines. Don't you feel that you will be greatly handicapped in
the beginning?"

"Perhaps," said Percy, "in some ways; but not in other ways. We hear
on every hand that this is an age of specialists, that the most
successful man cannot take time to prepare himself well for many
different lines of work; that he must make the best possible
preparation in some one line for which he may have special talent or
special interest; and then endeavor to go farther in that line than
any one has gone before. When I first wrote to the State University
I asked how long a time would likely be required for me to complete
all the subjects that are taught there, and the registrar replied
that, if I could carry heavy work every year, I might hope to take
all the courses now offered in about seventy years. In considering
this point of preparation for future work, it has seemed to me that
if I leave the farm life and devote myself to law or to engineering,
I must in large measure sacrifice about ten years of valuable
experience in practical agriculture. I have learned enough about
farming so that I can manage almost as well as the neighbors; and
without this knowledge, gathered, as you say, in the school of
experience, I can see that serious mistakes would often be made.

"You know that Doctor Miller bought the Bronson farm two years ago.
Well, he has been giving some directions himself concerning its
management. He has had no experience in farming, and last year,
after he had the new barn built, he directed his men to put the
sheaf oats in the barn so they would be safe from the weather. He
did not understand that oats must stand in the shock for two or
three weeks to become thoroughly "cured" before they can safely be
even stacked out of doors; and the result was that his entire oat
crop rotted in the barn.

"People who have lived always in the city sometimes express the most
amusing opinions of farm conditions so well understood even by a
ten-year-old country boy. I recently overheard two traveling men
remarking about the differences which they could plainly observe
between the corn crops in different fields as they rode past in the
train.

"'Some fields have twice as good corn as other adjoining fields,'
one remarked. 'How do you account for the difference,' asked the
other. 'oh, I suppose the one farmer was too stingy of his seed,'
was the reply.

"I am convinced that there are hundreds or perhaps thousands of
valuable facts that have been acquired through experience and
observation by the average farm boy of eighteen or twenty years that
would be of little or no value to him in most other occupations; and
in this respect I should be handicapped if I leave the farm life and
begin wholly at the bottom in some other profession. Perhaps
agriculture is not a profession, but I think it should be if the
highest success is to be attained."

"I surely hope you will be successful, Percy, and your reasoning
sounds all right; but other occupations seem to lead to greater
wealth than farming."

"I very much doubt," replied Percy, "if there is any other
occupation that is so uniformly successful as farming, in the truest
sense. It provides constant employment, a good living, and a
comfortable home for nearly all who engage in it; and as a rule they
have made no such preparation as is required for most other lines of
work.

"But there is still another side to the farm life, Mother dear, or
to any life for that matter. Your own life has taught me that to
work for the love of others is a motive which directs the noblest
lives. If agricultural missionaries are needed in India, they are
also needed in parts of our own country where farm lands that were
once productive are now greatly depleted and in some cases even
abandoned for farming; and. if the older lands of the corn belt are
already showing a decrease in productive power, we need the
missionary even here. If I can learn how to make land richer and
richer and lead others to follow such a system, I should find much
satisfaction in the effort."






CHAPTER V

WORN OUT FARMS





"WELL, you found some mighty poor land, I reckon," was the greeting
Percy received from Grandma West as he returned from his walk over
Westover and some neighboring farms.

"I found some land that produces very poor crops," he replied, "but
I don't know yet whether I should say that the land is poor."

"Well, I know it's about as poor as poor can be; but it was not
always poor, I can tell you. When I was a girl, if this farm did not
produce five or six thousands bushels of wheat, we thought it a poor
crop; but now, if we get five or six hundred bushels, we think we
are doing pretty well. My husband's father paid sixty-eight dollars
an acre for some of this land, and it was worth more than that a few
years later and, mind you, in those days wheat was worth less and
niggers a mighty sight more than they are nowadays; but, somehow,
the land has just grown poor. We don't know how. We have worked
hard, and we have kept as much stock as we could, but we could never
produce enough fertilizer on the farm to go very far on a thousand
acres.

"Yes, Sir, we have just about a thousand acres here and we still own
it,--and with no mortgage on it, I'm mighty glad to say. But, laws,
the land is poor, and you can get all the land you want about here
for ten dollars an acre. There comes Charles, now. He can tell you
all about this country for more than twenty miles, I reckon.

"Wilkes!" A negro servant answered the call, and took the horse as
Charles West stopped at the side gate.

"Wilkes was born here in slave times, nigh sixty years ago," she
continued. "He is three years older than my son Charles. He has
remained with us ever since the war, except for a few months when he
went away one time just to see for sure that he was free and _could
_go. But he came back mighty homesick and he'll want to stay here
till he dies, I reckon.

"Charles, this is Mr. Johnston, Percy Johnston, as he says; but he
thinks he is no kin of General Joe or Albert Sidney. He's been
looking at the land hereabout, but I don't think he'll want any of
it after seeing the kind of crops we raise."

With this introduction, the mother disappeared within the house, and
Charles took her seat on the vine-covered veranda.

"I feel that I owe an apology to you, Sir," said Percy, "for
presenting myself here with bag and baggage, and asking to share the
hospitality of your home, with no previous arrangements having been
made; but by chance I met your friend, Doctor Goddard, on the train,
and, in answer to my inquiry as to whom I could go to for correct
information concerning the history and present condition and value
of farm lands in this section of the country, he advised me to stop
off at Blue Mound Station and consult with you. Had I known that you
were to be in Montplain to-day, of course I should have gone
directly there. Your mother very graciously consented to receive me
as a belated summer boarder, a kindness which I greatly appreciate,
I assure you.

"My mother and I have a small farm in Illinois,--so small that it
would be lost in such an estate as Westover, but the price of land
is very high in the West at the present time; and I am really
considering the question of selling our little forty-acre farm and
purchasing two or three hundred acres in the East or South. My
thought is that I might secure a farm that was once good land, but
that has been run down to such an extent that it can be bought for
perhaps ten or twenty dollars an acre. I should want the land to be
nearly level so that it would not be difficult to prevent damage
from surface washing. I should prefer, of course, to purchase where
there is a good road and not more than five miles from a railway
station.

"If I secure such a farm, it would be my purpose to restore its
fertility. If possible I should want to make the land at least as
productive as it ever was, even in its virgin state."

"Well, Sir," said Mr. West, "if you could accomplish your purpose
and ultimately show a balance on the right side of the ledger, it
would be a work of very great value to this country. There will be
no difficulty in securing such land as you want with location and
price to suit you; but I think that you should know in advance that
older men than you have purchased farms hereabout with very similar
intentions, but with the ultimate result that they have lost more,
financially, than we who are native to the soil; for, while we were
once well-to-do and are now poor, we still own our land,
impoverished as it is. However, the farm still furnishes us a
comfortable living, supplemented, to be sure, with some income from
other sources.

"I am very willing to give as much information as I can regarding
our lands and the agricultural conditions and common practices,
although I fear that this knowledge will discourage you from making
any investments in our worn-out farms. If you still decide to make
the trial, I surely hope you will be successful, for we need such an
object lesson above all else.

"I assume that you will wish to locate near a town of considerable
size, in order that you can haul manures from town, and perhaps some
feed also; and have a good market for your milk and other products."

"No, Sir," said Percy, "I should prefer not to engage in dairying,
and I do not wish to make use of fertilizer made from my neighbors'
crops. We have some object lessons of that kind in my own state; and
I have no doubt that some can be found in this state who feed all
they produce on their own land and perhaps even larger amounts of
feed purchased from their neighbors, or hauled from town, and who,
in addition to using all of the farm fertilizer thus produced, haul
considerable amounts of such materials from the livery stables in
town. With much hard work, with a good market for the products of
the dairy and truck garden, and with business skill in purchasing
feed from their neighbors when prices are low, such men succeed as
individuals; but do they furnish an object lesson which could be
followed by the general farmer?"

"I had not looked at the matter from that point of view," said Mr.
West, "but it is plain to see that on the whole there can be only a
small percentage of such farmers; and in reality they are a
detriment to their neighbors who permit their own hay and grain to
be hauled off from their farms; but certainly these are the methods
followed by our most successful farmers, and these are they who live
on the fat of the land."

"Are they farmers or are they manufacturers?" asked Percy. "It seems
to me that, in large measure, their business is to manufacture a
finished product from the raw materials produced upon other farms,
either in the immediate neighborhood or in the newer regions of the
West. As you know, much of our surplus produce from the farms of the
corn belt is shipped into the eastern and southern states, there to
be used as food for man and beast, not only in the cities, but also
to a considerable extent in the country. Instead of living on the
fat of the land, such manufacturers live in the country at the
expense of special city customers who may have fat jobs and are able
to pay fancy prices for country produce made by the impoverishment
of many farms. In most cases, if such a 'successful farmer' were
compelled to pay average prices for what he buys and allowed to
receive only average prices for what he sells, his fat would have
plenty of lean streaks."






CHAPTER VI

THE MUSICALE





DINNER was served at the family table, with Mr. West at the head and
his mother at the foot.

"The eye is the window of the soul," thought Percy, as he met the
glance of Adelaide sitting opposite. Certain he was that he had
never before looked into such alluring eyes.

Adelaide was neither a girl nor a woman and yet at times she was
both. With the other children she was a child that still loved to
romp and play with the rest, free as a bird. Her mother, a
sweet-faced woman, some years her husband's junior, made sisters of
all her daughters, the more naturally perhaps, because the
grandmother was still so active and so interested in all phases of
homemaking that she seemed mother to them all. Adelaide's two older
sisters were married and her brother Charles, also older than
herself, by three years, was a senior in college. Adelaide had just
finished her course in the Academy where the long service of a
maiden aunt as a teacher had secured certain appreciated privileges,
without which it is doubtful if both Charles and Adelaide could have
been sent away to school at the same time. A boy of fourteen and the
eight-year old baby brother with two sisters between comprised the
younger members of the family.

Miss Bowman, the teacher of the district school, also occupied a
place at the table. The evening meal was disposed of without delay,
for there was something of greater importance to follow. A musicale
in the near-by country church had been in preparation and Percy
heartily accepted an invitation to accompany the family to the
evening's entertainment. Or rather he accompanied Mr. and Mrs. West
and the grandmother, for all the children had walked the distance
before the carriage arrived.

Without having specialized in music, nevertheless Percy had improved
the frequent opportunities he had had, especially while at the
university, and he had learned to appreciate quality in the musical
world. Consequently he was not a little surprised and greatly
pleased to sit and listen to a class of music that he had never
before heard rendered in country places; but, as he listened for
Adelaide's singing in chorus, duet, and solo, he found himself
wondering whether the eye or the voice more clearly revealed the
soul.

"It seemed like the old times," said the grandmother, with something
like a sigh, as she took her place in the carriage. "If our land was
only like it used to be! but it's become so mighty poor our children
can't have many advantages these days. The Harcourt's and Staunton's
whom you met are descendants of ancestors once well known in this
state."

"It seems to me that the land need not have grown poor," said
Percy. "If the land was once productive, its fertility ought to be
maintained by the return of the essential materials removed in crops
or destroyed by cultivation. Surely land need not become poor; but
of course I know too little about this land to suggest at the
present time what method could best be adopted for its improvement."

"We can tell you what the best method is," she quickly replied.
"Just put on plenty of ordinary farm fertilizer, but, laws, we don't
have enough to cover fifty acres a year."

For a time each seemed lost in thought, or listening to the husband
and wife who sat in the front seat quietly talking of the evening's
performances. Percy recognized some of the names they mentioned as
belonging to persons to whom he had been presented at the church. It
gradually dawned upon him that he had spent the evening with the
aristocracy of the Blue Mound neighborhood. Culture, refinement, and
poverty were the chief characteristics of the people who had been
assembled.

"It need not have been," he repeated to himself; "surely, it need
not have been, "and then he wondered if these were not much sadder
words than the oft repeated "it might have been."

"May I ask where your people came from, Mrs. West?" he questioned.

"Where we came from?" she repeated, "I don't quite understand."

"Excuse me," said Percy, "but in the West it is so common to ask
people where they are from. You know the West is settled with people
from all sections of the East, and many from Europe and from Canada,
and I thought your ancestors may have moved here from some other
state, as from Pennsylvania for example, where my mother's people
once lived."

"Let me advise you, Young Man," said the grandmother briskly, and in
a tone that reminded Percy of the twinkle he had at times noticed in
her eyes when she seemed young again--"Let me advise you never to
ask a Virginian if he was born in Pennsylvania. That's more than
most Virginians can stand. Once a Virginian, always a
Virginian,--both now, hereafter, and hitherto. It's mighty hard to
find a Virginian who came from anywhere except from the royal blood
of England; although some may condescend to acknowledge kinship to
the Scottish royalty."

The grandmother's voice was raised to a pitch which commanded the
attention of the other members in the carriage and a hearty laugh
followed her jovial wit, to the full relief of Percy's temporary
embarrassment.

"Well," she continued, "to answer your question: my husband and my
children are direct descendants of Colonel Charles West, a brother
of Lord Delaware, who was Sir Thomas West, whose ancestry goes back
to Henry the Second, of England, and to David the First, of
Scotland; and my granddaughter is the great-granddaughter of Patrick
Henry. So now you know where _we _came from," and she laughed again
like a girl. "Yes," she added, "we have a family tree six feet from
branch to branch, but it is stored in a back room where I am sure it
is covered with cobwebs, for we have no time to live with the past
when the summer boarders are here."

As the carriage stopped at the side gate, the children's voices
could be heard in the rear; for Mr. West had been living over again
his younger days with his sweet-faced wife, and the farm team had
taken its own time.






CHAPTER VII

A BIT OF HISTORY





"NOW, I shall be at home to-day and glad to assist you in any way
possible," announced Mr. West at the breakfast table.

"That is very kind of you," Percy replied. "I want especially to
learn some of the things you know about the soils of Westover. Can
you show me the best land and the poorest land on the estate?"

"I think I can." said Mr. West. "We have some land that has not
grown a crop in fifty years, and we have other land that still
produces a very fair crop if properly rotated."

"And what rotation do you practice?"

"Well, the system we have finally settled into and have followed for
many years is to plow up the run-out pasture land and plant to corn.
The second year we usually raise a crop of wheat or oats and seed
down to clover and timothy. We then try to cut hay from the land for
two years, and afterward we use the field for pasture for six or
eight years, or until finally it produces only weeds and foul grass.
Then we cover it with farm manure, so far as we can, and again plow
the land for corn. Wheat and cattle are the principal products sold
from the farm."

"In this way," said Percy, "you grow one crop of corn on the same
field about once in ten or twelve years."

"Yes, about that, and also one, or sometimes two, crops of small
grain. We usually have about seventy-five acres of corn, nearly a
hundred acres of small grain, and we cut hay from somewhat more than
hundred acres, thus leaving perhaps five hundred acres of pasture
land, besides about two hundred acres of timber land which has not
been cultivated for many years."

"Was the timber land that we see about here formerly cultivated?"
asked Percy.

"Oh, yes, nearly all of it was under cultivation when I was a boy,
although some had been allowed to go back to timber even before I
was born. On our own farm we have some timber land that, so far as I
have been able to learn, was never under cultivation; and the
character of the trees is different on that land. There you will
find original pine, but on the worn-out land the 'old-field' pine
are found. They are practically worthless, while the original pine
makes very valuable lumber.

"With our system of rotation we keep about all of our farm under
control; but the smaller farms were necessarily cropped more
continuously to support the family, and they became so unproductive
that many of them have been completely abandoned for agricultural
purposes; and even some of the large plantations were poorly
managed, one part having been cropped continuously until too poor to
pay for cropping, while the remainder was allowed to grow up in
scrub brush and 'old-field' pine; and, of course, the expense of
clearing such land is about as much as the net value of the crops
that could be grown until it again becomes too poor for cropping."

"Then the recleared lands are not as productive as when they were
first cleared from the virgin forest?"

"Oh, by no means. In the virgin state these lands grew bountiful
crops almost continuously for a hundred years or more. Virginia was
famed at home and abroad for her virgin fertility. Great crops of
corn, wheat, and tobacco were grown. Tobacco was a valuable export
crop, and there were many Virginians whose mothers came to America
with passage paid for in tobacco. History records, you may remember,
that it was the custom for a time to permit a young man to pay into
a general store house a hundred pounds of tobacco,--and this was
later increased to one hundred fifty pounds,--to be used in payment
of passage for young women who were thus enabled to come to America;
and there was a very distinct understanding that only those who had
come forth with the tobacco were eligible as suitors for the hand of
any 'imported' maiden. As a matter of fact some such arrangement as
this was almost a necessity," said Mr. West, as he noted Adelaide's
almost incredulous look. "Among the first settlers in Virginia,
young men greatly predominated; and in the main the people in the
home country were themselves in poverty. Under the hereditary laws
of England the father's estate and title became the possession of
his eldest son; and in large measure the other children of the
family were thrown absolutely upon their own resources, so that
many, even with royal blood in their veins, were very glad to
embrace any opportunity offered to seek a new home in this land of
virgin richness.

"Of course," he continued, smilingly and in direct answer to
Adelaide's inquiring look, "those young women were in no sense bound
to accept the attention or the offer of any man; but naturally most
of them did become the wives of those who were able to offer them a
husband's love and a home with more of life's comforts perhaps than
they had ever known before. They were at perfect liberty, however,
to remain in the enjoyment of single blessedness if they chose, and
I doubt not," he added, with a twinkle in his eyes, "that some of
them had no other choice."






CHAPTER VIII

WESTOVER





WITH an auger in his hand, by means of which a hole could be quickly
bored into the soil to a depth of three or four feet, Percy joined
Mr. West for the tramp over the plantation.

In general the estate called Westover consists of undulating upland.
A small stream crosses one corner of the farm bordered by some
twenty acres of bottom land which is subject to frequent overflow,
and used only for permanent pasture. Several draws or small valleys
are tributary to the stream valley, thus furnishing excellent
surface drainage for the entire farm. In some places the sides of
these valleys are quite sloping and subject to moderate erosion when
not protected by vegetation. Above and between these slopes the
upland is nearly level. As they came upon one of these level areas,
grown up with small forest trees, Mr. West stopped and said:

"Now right here is probably as poor a piece of land as there is on
the farm. This land will positively not grow a crop worth harvesting
unless it is well fertilized."

"If we were in the Illinois corn belt," replied Percy, "I should
expect to find the land in this position to be the most productive
on the farm. Our level uplands are now valued at from one hundred
fifty to two hundred dollars an acre. A farm of one hundred eighty
acres, five miles from town, sold for two hundred and fourteen
dollars an acre a few days before I started east."

"Well," said Mr. West, "this may have been good land once, but if so
it was before my time. Of course most of our uplands here have been
cropped for upwards of two hundred years; and about all that has
ever been done to keep up the fertility of the soil has been to
rotate the crops. To be sure, the farm manure has always been used
as far as it would go, but the supply is really very small compared
to the need for it."

"Do you think that the proper rotation of crops would maintain the
fertility of the soil?" asked Percy.

"No, I have tried too many rotations to think that, but I suppose it
is a help in that direction, don't you?"

"I would say that crop rotation may help to maintain the supply of
some important constituents of a fertile soil, but it will certainly
hasten the depletion of some other equally essential constituents."

"Well, that's a new idea to me. I may not quite grasp your meaning;
but first tell me about these tests you are making."

When they stopped on the area of poor land as designated by Mr.
West, Percy had turned his auger into the earth and drawn out a
sample of moist soil, which he molded into the form of a ball. He
broke this in two, inserted a piece of blue paper, and pressed it
firmly together. He then laid the ball of soil aside, secured
another sample with the auger, and formed it into a cake with a
hollow in the upper surface. He took from his pocket a slender box
or tube of light wood, removed the screw cap, and drew out a
glass-stoppered bottle.

"This bottle contains hydrochloric acid," said Percy. "It is often
incorrectly called 'muriatic acid.' It consists of two elements,
hydrogen and chlorin, from which its name is derived. But you are
perhaps already familiar with the chemical elements."

"Well, I heard lectures at William and Mary for four years, and they
included some chemistry as it was then taught; but they certainly
did not include the application of chemistry to agriculture, and I
am greatly interested to know the meaning of these tests you are
making here on our own farm under my own eyes. You may take it for
granted that I know absolutely nothing of such use of chemistry as
you are evidently turning to some practical value."

"Any other farmer can make these tests as well as I can," said
Percy. "This bottle of acid cost me fifteen cents and it can be
duplicated for the same price at almost any drug store. The acid is
very concentrated, in fact about as strong as can easily be
produced, but it need not be especially pure. Some care should be
taken not to get it on the clothing or on the fingers, although it
is not at all dangerous to handle, but it tends to burn the fingers
unless soon removed, either by washing with water or by rubbing it
off with the moist soil."

"I use this acid to test the soil for the presence or absence of
limestone. Ordinary limestone consists of calcium carbonate. Here,
again the chemical name alone is sufficient to indicate the elements
that compose this compound. It is only necessary to keep in mind the
fact that the ending _-ate_ on the common chemical names signifies
the presence of oxygen Thus calcium carbon_ate_ is composed of the
three primary elements, calcium, carbon and oxygen.

"Of course the chemical element is the simplest form of matter. An
element is a primary substance which cannot be divided into two or
more substances All known matter consists of about eighty of these
primary elements; and, as a matter of fact, most of these are of
rare occurence--many of them much more rare than the element gold.

"About ninety-eight per cent. of the soil consists of eight elements
united in various compounds or combinations; and only ten elements
are essential for the growth and full development of corn or other
plants. If any one of these ten elements is lacking, it is
impossible to produce a kernel of corn, a grain of wheat, or a leaf
of clover; and in the main the supply is under the farmer's own
control. But we can discuss this matter more fully later. Let us see
what we have here."

Percy poured a few drops of the hydrochloric acid into the hollow of
the cake of soil.

"What should it do?" asked Mr. West.

"If the soil contains any limestone, the acid should produce
foaming, or effervescence," replied Percy; "but it is very evident
that this soil contains no limestone. You see the hydrochloric acid
has power to decompose calcium carbonate with the formation of
carbonic acid and calcium chlorid, a kind of salt that is used to
make a brine that won't freeze in the artificial ice plants. The
carbonic acid, if produced at once decomposes into water and carbon
dioxid. Now, the liberated carbon dioxid is a gas and the rapid
generation or evolution of this gas constitutes the bubbling or
foaming we are looking for; but since there is no appearance of
foaming we know that this soil contains no limestone."

"Then you have already found that those three elements,--calcium,
carbon, and oxygen, you called them, I think--you find that those
elements are all lacking in this soil."

"No, this test does not prove that," said Percy. "It only proves
that they are not present as limestone. Calcium may be present in
other compounds, especially in silicates, which are the most
abundant compounds in the soil and in the earth's crust; and, as
indicated by the ending _-ate, _oxygen is contained in calcium
silicate as well as in calcium carbonate."

"I see; the subject is much more complicated than I thought."

"Somewhat, perhaps," Percy replied; "but yet it is quite simple and
very easily understood, if we only keep in mind a few well
established facts. Certainly the essential science of soil fertility
is much less complicated than many of the political questions of the
day, such as the gold standard or free-silver basis, the tariff
issues, and reciprocity advantages, regarding which most farmers are
fairly well informed,--at least to such an extent that they can
argue these questions for hours."

"I think you are quite right in that," said Mr. West. "Of course, it
is important that every citizen entitled to the privilege of voting
in a democracy like ours should be able to exercise his franchise
intelligently; but the citizen who is responsible for the management
of farm lands ought surely to be at least as well informed
concerning the principles which underlie the maintenance of soil
fertility; provided, of course, that such knowledge is within his
reach; and from what you say I am beginning to believe that such is
the case. At any rate this simple test seems to show conclusively
that this soil contains no limestone, and it is common knowledge
that limestone soils are good soils."

Percy took up the ball of soil containing the slip of blue paper,
broke it in two again, and it was seen that the paper had changed in
color from blue to red

"There's a change, for certain," said Mr. West, "that has some
meaning to you I suppose."

"This is litmus paper," said Percy. "It is prepared by moistening
specially prepared paper with a solution of a coloring matter called
litmus, and the paper is then dried. This coloring matter has the
property of turning blue in the presence of alkali and red in the
presence of acid. The blue paper is prepared with a trace of alkali,
and the red paper with a trace of acid. If more than a trace were
present the litmus paper would not be sufficiently sensitive for the
test.

"This little bottle containing two dozen slips of paper cost me five
cents, and it can be obtained at most drug stores.

"Alkali and acid are exactly opposite terms, like hot and cold. The
one neutralizes the other. This test with litmus paper is a test for
soil acidity, and the fact that the moisture of the soil has turned
the litmus from blue to red shows that this soil is acid, or sour.
The soil moisture contained enough acid to neutralize the trace of
alkali contained in the blue paper and to change the paper to a
distinctly light red color; and the fact that the paper remains red
even after drying, shows that the soil contains fixed acids or acid
salts, and not merely carbonic acid, which if present would
completely volatilize as the paper dries.

"Now, these two tests are in harmony. The one shows the absence of
limestone, and the other shows the presence of acidity, and
consequently the need of limestone to correct or neutralize the
acidity, for limestone itself is an alkali."

"But limestone soils are not alkali soils, are they?" asked Mr.
West.

"Not in the sense of containing injurious alkali, like sodium
carbonate, the compound which is found in the 'black alkali' lands
of the arid regions of the far West; but chemically considered
limestone is truly an alkali; and, as such, it has power to
neutralze this soil acidity."

"Is the acidity harmful to the crops?"

"It is not particularly harmful to the common crops of the grass
family, such as wheat, corn, oats, and timothy; but some of the most
valuable crops for soil improvement will not thrive on acid soils.
This is especially true of clover and alfalfa."

"That is certainly correct for clover so far as this kind of soil is
concerned," said Mr. West. "Clover never amounts to much on this
kind of land, except where heavily fertilized. When fertilized it
usually grows well. Does the farm fertilizer neutralize the acid?"

"Only to a small extent. It is true that farm manures contain very
appreciable amounts of lime and some other alkaline, or basic,
substances, but in addition to this, and perhaps of greater
importance, is the fact that such fertilizer has power to feed the
clover crop as well as other crops. In other words it furnishes the
essential materials of which these crops are made. In addition to
this the decaying organic matter has power to liberate some plant
food from the soil which would not otherwise be made available
although to that extent the farm manure serves as a soil stimulant,
this action tending not toward soil enrichment but toward the
further depletion of the store of fertility still remaining in the
soil."

"This seems a complicated problem," said Mr. West, "but may I now
show you some of our more productive land?"

"As soon as I collect a sample of this," replied Percy, and to Mr.
West's surprise he proceeded to bore about twenty holes in the space
of two or three acres. The borings were taken to a depth of about
seven inches, and after being thoroughly mixed together an average
sample of the lot was placed in a small bag bearing a number which
Percy recorded in his note book together with a description of the
land.

"I wish to have an analysis made of this sample," remarked Percy, as
they resumed their walk.

"But I thought you had analyzed this soil," was the reply.

"Oh, I only tested for limestone and acidity," explained Percy. "I
wish to have exact determinations made of the nitrogen and
phosphorus, and perhaps of the potassium, magnesium, and calcium.
All of these are absolutely essential for the growth of every
agricultural plant; and any one of them may be deficient in the
soil, although" the last three are not so likely to be as the other
two."

"How long will it take to make this analysis?" was asked.

"About a week or ten days. Perhaps I shall collect two or three
other samples and send them all together to an analytical chemist.
It is the only way to secure positive knowledge in advance as to
what these soils contain. In other words, by this means we can take
an absolute invoice of the stock of fertility in the soil, just as
truly as the merchant can take an invoice of the stock of goods
carried on his shelves."

"So far as we are concerned, this would not be an invoice in
advance," remarked Mr. West, with a shade of sadness in his voice.
"If we knew the contents of the crops that have been sold from this
farm during the two centuries past, we would have a fairly good
invoice, I fear, of what the virgin soil contained; but can you
compare the invoice of the soil with that of the merchant's goods?"

"Quite fairly so," Percy replied. "The plant food content of the
plowed soil of an acre of normal land means nearly, if not quite, as
much in the making of definite plans for a system of permanent
agriculture, as the merchant's invoice means in the future plans of
his business.

"It should not be assumed that the analysis of the soil will give
information the application of which will always assure an abundant
crop the following season. In comparison, it may also be said,
however, that the merchant's invoice of January the first may have
no relation to the sales from his store on January the second. Now,
the year with the farmer is as a day with the merchant. The farmer
harvests his crop but once a year; while the merchant plants and
harvests every day, or at least every week. But I would say that the
invoice of the soil is worth as much to the farmer for the next year
as the merchant's invoice is to him for the next month.

"It should be remembered, however, that both must look forward, and
plans must be made by the merchant for several months, and by the
farmer for several years. Your twelve-year rotation is a very good
example of the kind of future planning the successful farmer must
do. On the other hand, some of your neighbors, who have not
practiced some such system of rotation now have 'old-field' pine on
land long since abandoned, and soil too poor to cultivate on land
long cropped continuously."

"This is a kind soil," remarked Mr. West, as he paused on a gently
undulating part of the field.

"That is a new use of the word to me," said Percy. "Just what do you
mean by a 'kind' soil?"

"Well, if we apply manure here it will show in the crop for many
years. It is easy to build this soil up with manure; but, of course,
we have too little to treat it right."

"The soil is almost neutral," said Percy, testing with litmus and
acid. "Does clover grow on this soil?"

"Very little, except where we put manure."

Another composite sample of the soil was collected, and they walked
on.

"Now, here," said Mr. West, "is about the most productive upland on
the farm."

"Is that possible?" asked Percy, the question being directed more to
himself than to his host.

"That is according to my observation for about fifty years," he
replied. "Where we spread the farm fertilizer over this old pasture
land and plow it under for corn, we often harvest a crop of eight
barrels to the acre, while the average of the field will not be more
than five barrels.--A barrel of corn with us is five bushels."

They had stopped on one of the steepest slopes in the field.

"These hillsides would be considered the poorest land on the farm if
we were in the corn belt," said Percy, "but I think I understand the
difference. Your level uplands when once depleted remain depleted,
because the soil that was plowed two hundred years ago is the same
soil that is plowed to-day; but these slopes lose surface soil by
erosion at least as rapidly as the mineral plant food is removed by
cropping; and to that extent they afford the conditions for a
permanent system of agriculture of low grade, unless, of course, the
erosion is more rapid than the disintegration of the underlying bed
rock, which I note is showing in some outcrops in the gullies.

"I want some samples here," he continued, and at once proceeded to
collect a composite sample of the surface soil and another of the
sub-soil.

"In the main this soil is slightly acid," said Percy, after several
tests, with the hydrochloric acid and the litmus paper; "although
occasionally there are traces of limestone present. The mass of soil
seems to be faintly acid, but here and there are little pieces of
limestone which still produce some localized benefit, and probably
prevent the development of more marked acidity throughout the soil
mass.

"If I can get to an express office this afternoon," he continued, "I
shall be glad to forward these four composite samples to an
analyst."

"If you wouldn't mind riding to Montplain with Adelaide when she
goes for her music lesson this afternoon, it would be very
convenient," said Mr. West.

"With your daughter's permission that would suit me very well," he
replied. "I shall be glad to spend one or two days more in this
vicinity, and then I wish to visit other sections for a week or two,
after which I would be glad to stop here again on my return trip and
probably I shall have the report of the chemist concerning these
samples."






CHAPTER IX

THE BLACK PERIL





AS Percy stepped out of the house in the early afternoon upon the
announcement from Wilkes that "De ca'age is ready," he noted that
the "ca'age" was the two-seated family carriage and that Adelaide
had already taken her place in the front seat, as driver, with her
music roll and another bundle tucked in by her side. Her glance at
Percy and at the rear seat was also sufficient to indicate his
place.

"This does not seem right to me, Miss West," said Percy. "Unless you
prefer to drive I shall be very glad to do so and let you occupy
this more comfortable seat."

"No thank you," she replied, in a tone that left no room for
argument. "I often drive our guests to and from the station, and I
much prefer this seat."

The rear seat was roomy and low, so that Percy could scarcely see
the road ahead even by sitting on the opposite side from the driver.

Aside from an occasional commonplace remark both the driver and the
passenger were allowed to use the time for meditation.

While Adelaide was already an experienced horsewoman, she was rarely
permitted to drive the colts to the village, although she enjoyed
riding the more spirited horses, or driving with her brother in the
"buck board."

A mile from the village the road wound through a wooded valley, and
then climbed the opposite slope, passing the railway station a
quarter of a mile from town and the "depot hotel" near by. Here
Percy left the carriage with the bags of soil, it being arranged
that he would be waiting at the hotel when Adelaide returned from
the village.

Adelaide's "hour" was from four to five, and being the last pupil
for the day, the teacher was not prompt to close.

"I did not realize the days were becoming so short," said Miss
Konster as she opened the door. "I'm sorry you have so far to
drive."

"Oh, I don't mind," said Adelaide, "I know the way home well enough.
You see I have the double carriage, for I brought a guest to the
depot as usual, although he is to return with me, and is probably
very tired of waiting at the 'depot hotel.'"

It was nearly dark as Percy took his place in the rear seat,
Adelaide having again declined to yield her position as driver, and
now she had more packages nearly filling the seat beside her.

The team leisurely took the homeward way and nothing more was said
except an occasional word of encouragement to the horses. They
passed the lowest point in the valley and began to ascend the gentle
slope, when the carriage suddenly stopped, and Adelaide uttered a
muffled scream. "Come, Honey, said a masculine voice."

As Percy half rose to his feet, he saw that a negro had grasped
Adelaide in an effort to drag her from the carriage. A blow from
Percy staggered the brute and he released his hold of Adelaide, but,
as he saw Percy jump from the carriage on the opposite side, he
paused.

"De's a man heah. Knock him, Geo'ge," he yelled, as he turned to
again grapple with Adelaide

"Coward," cried Adelaide, as she saw Percy jump from the carriage
and dart up the road. Facing this black brute, she was standing
alone now with one hand on the back of the seat. As the negro sprang
at her the second time he uttered a scream like the cry of a beast
and fell sprawling on his face. Almost at the same moment his
companion was fairly lifted from his feet and came down headlong
beside the carriage.

"Look out for the horses," called Percy, as he drove the heels of
his heavy shoes into the moaning mass on the ground.

"Lie there, you brute," he cried, "don't you dare to move."

"I have the lines," said Adelaide hoarsely, "but can't I do
something more?"

"No. they're both down," he answered. "Wait a minute."

He found himself between the negroes lying with their faces to the
ground. Instantly he grasped each by the wrist and with an inward
twist he brought forth cried for mercy. It was a trick he had
learned in college, that, by drawing the arm behind the back and
twisting, a boy could control a strong man.

"Can't I help you?" Adelaide called again, and Percy saw that she
was out of the carriage and standing near.

"Will the horses stand?" he asked.

"Oh, yes, they're quiet now."

"Then take the tie rope and tie their feet together. Use the slip
knot just as you do for the hitching post," he directed. "If they
dare to move I can wrench their arms out in this position. Right
there at the ankles. Tie them tight and as closely together as you
can. Wrap it twice around if it's long enough."

Adelaide tied one end of the rope around the ankle of one negro and
wrapped the other end around the ankle of the other, drawing their
feet together and fastening the ends of the rope with a double
hitch, which she knew well how to make.

Percy gave the rope a kick to tighten it.

"Now get onto your feet and I'll march you to town," he ordered,
adding pressure to the twist upon their wrists and drawing them back
upon their knees Thus assisted, they struggled to their feet.

"I am afraid you will have to drive home alone, Miss West," began
Percy, when Adelaide interrupted with:

"No, no, if you are going back to town, I will follow you. I can
easily turn the team and I will keep close behind."

Thus tied together, Percy almost ran his prisoners toward the
village, still holding each firmly by the wrist. As they reached the
"depot hotel," he called for assistance, and several men quickly
appeared.

Percy made a brief report of the attack as they moved on to the town
house, where the villians were placed in shackles and left in charge
of the marshall.

"Will you drive, please, Mr. Johnston?" asked Adelaide as he stepped
to the carriage; for Adelaide had followed almost to the door of the
jail house.

"Yes, please," he replied, taking the seat beside her.

"I hope you will pardon my calling you a coward, I felt so
desperate, and it seemed to me for the moment that you were leaving
me." Adelaide's voice still had an excited tremor to it.

"I heard you say 'coward,'" said Percy, "but I didn't realize that
you referred to me. I saw the two brutes almost at the same time,
the one who attacked you and the other on the same side near the
horses' heads. I struck the one as best I could from my position,
and as he yelled and the horses reared, I ran up the slope ahead of
the team and came down at the other brute with a blow in the neck,
but I was surprised to find them both sprawling on the ground; and
under the street lights I saw that one of them had an eye
frightfully jammed. I am sure I struck neither of them in the eye."

Adelaide made no reply, but she knew now that the piercing, beastly
cry from the negro reaching for her was brought forth because the
heel of her shoe had entered the socket of the brute's eye.

"You're mighty nigh too late for supper, said grandma West, as they
stopped at the side gate. Adelaide hurried to her father who took
her in his arms as he saw how she trembled.

"My child!" he said.

Yes, child she was as she relaxed from the tension of the last hour
and related the experience of the evening.

"I cannot express our gratitude to you, Sir," said Mr. West: "I am
glad you landed the devils in jail."

"I am only thankful I was there when it happened," replied Percy. "I
am sure no man could have done less. I have promised to return to
town in the morning to serve as legal witness in the case. I hope
your daughter need not be called upon for that."

"Probably that will not be necessary," Mr. West replied.






CHAPTER X

THE SLAVE AND THE FREEDMAN





THE others had retired but Percy and his host continued their
conversation far into the night.

"There are almost as great variations among the negroes as among
white people," Mr. West was saying. "To a man like Wilkes who was
born and raised here on the farm, I would entrust the protection of
my wife and children as readily as to any white man. He has been
educated, so to speak, to a sense of duty and honor; and negroes of
his class have almost never been known to violate a trust. Of course
there are bad niggers, but as a rule such negroes have grown up
under conditions that would develop the evil in any race of men.

"During the Secession it was the most common thing for the men to go
to war and leave their defenseless women and children wholly in the
care of their slaves; and, even though the federal soldiers were
fighting to free the slaves and their masters to keep them in
slavery, rarely did a negro fail to remain faithful to his trust.
They hid from the northern soldiers the horses and mules, cotton and
corn, clothing and provisions, and all sorts of valuables; and in
most cases were ready to suffer themselves before they would reveal
the hidden property. To be sure there were masters who abused their
slaves, and some of these were naturally ready to desert at the
first opportunity; but in the main the slave owner was more kind to
his human property than the considerate soldier was to his horse,
and the negro as a race is appreciative of kindness."

"I suppose the depreciation in soil fertility and crop yields dates
largely from the freeing of the slaves does it not?" asked Percy.

"Well, that was one factor, but not the most potential factor. Much
land in the south had been abandoned agriculturally long before the
war, and much land in New York and New England has been abandoned
since the war. The freeing of the negroes produced much less effect
in the economic conditions of the south than many have supposed. The
great injury to the South from the war was due to the war itself and
not to the freeing of slaves. In the main it cost no more to hire
the negro after the war than it cost to feed and clothe him before;
and the humane slave owner had little difficulty in getting plenty
of negro help after the war. Very commonly his own slaves remained
with him and were treated as servants, not particularly differently
than they had been treated as slaves. Of course there were some
brutal slave holders, just as there are brutal horse owners, and
such men suffered very much from the loss of slave labor.

"The southern people have no regrets for the freeing of the slaves.
Probably it was the best thing that ever happened to us; and the
South would have less regret for the war itself, except that our
recovery from it was greatly delayed by the reconstruction policy
which was followed after the war. The immediate enfranchisement of
the negro, especially in those sections where this resulted in
placing all the power of the local government in the hands of the
negro, was a worse blow to the South than the war itself.

"It is believed that this would not have been done if Lincoln had
lived. Lincoln was always the President of all the people of the
United States, and his death was a far greater loss to the South
than to the North. To place the power to govern the intelligent
white of the South absolutely in the hands of their former ignorant
slaves was undoubtedly the most abominable political blunder
recorded in history; and even this was intensified by the
unprincipled white-skinned vultures who came among us to fatten upon
our dead or dying conditions. Those years of so-called
reconstruction, constitute the blackest page in the history of
modern civilization."

"I quite agree with you," said Percy, "and so far as I know them the
soldiers of the northern armies also agree with you. Several of my
own relatives fought to free the negro slave; but none of them
fought to enslave their white brothers of the South by putting them
absolutely under negro government. And yet there is one possible
justification for that abominable reconstruction policy. It may have
averted a subsequent war which might have lasted not for four years,
but for forty years. Even if this be true, perhaps there is no
credit in the policy for any man who helped to enforce it, but you
will grant that there were two important results from those bitter
years of reconstruction:

"First, the negro learned with certainty at once and forever that he
was a free man.

"Second, he at once acquired a degree of independence effectually
preventing the development of a situation throughout the South, in
which the negro, though nominally free, would have remained
virtually a slave, a situation which, if once established, might
have required a subsequent war of many years for its complete
eradication. Even under the conditions which have prevailed, there
have been isolated instances of peonage in the southern states since
the war; and if the education and gradual enfranchisement of the
negro had been left wholly in the hands of their former masters,
from the immediate close of the war, I can conceive of conditions
under which slavery would essentially have been continued."

"Such a possibility is, of course, conceivable," said Mr. West, "and
we must all admit that there were some slave holders who would have
taken advantage of any such opportunity; but had Lincoln lived the
terms made would probably have been such that the South would have
felt in honor bound to enforce them. Probably the enfranchisement
would have been based upon some sort of qualification such as the
southern states have very generally adopted in subsequent years; but
the idea of social equality of slave and master was so repulsive to
the white people of the South that it could not be tolerated under
any sort of government."

"This question of social equality," remarked Percy, "has probably
been the cause of more misunderstanding between the North and the
South than all other questions relating to the negro problem. I have
rarely, if ever, talked with a southern man who did not have it
firmly fixed in his mind that the common idea of the northern people
is that the negro race should be made the social equal of the white
race. This I have heard from southern lecturers; I have read it in
southern newspapers; and I have found it in books written by
southern authors; but, Mr. West, I have never yet heard that idea
advanced by a man or woman of the North.

"Of course there have been visionary theorists or 'cranks' in all
ages, and there must have been some basis for this almost universal
erroneous opinion in the South that the people of the North
advocated social equality or social intercourse between the white
and colored races; and yet nothing could be farther from the truth.
In all my life in the North, I think I have never seen a colored
person dining with a white man. This does not prove that there are
no such occurrences, but it certainly shows that they are extremely
rare. On the other hand, in traveling through the South I have seen
a white woman bring her colored maid or nurse, to the dining car and
sit at the same table with herself and husband. Of course there is
no suggestion of social equality or social intercourse in this, but
there is a much closer relationship than is common or would be
allowed in the North."

"That may be true," said Mr. West, "and there was in slave times a
very intimate relationship between the negro nurses and the white
children of the South. Some of our people are ready to take offense
at the suggestion that we talk negro dialect, and perhaps we would
all prefer to say that the negroes have learned to talk as we talk;
but the truth is that the negroes were brought to America chiefly as
adults; and, as is usually the case when adult people learn a new
language, they modified ours because their own African language did
not contain all of the sounds of the English tongue. Similarly we
hear and recognize the other nationalities when they learn to speak
English. Thus we have the Irish brogue, the German brogue, and the
French brogue, or dialect.

"The negro children learned to speak the dialect as spoken by their
own parents; and as a very general rule the white children learned
to talk as their negro nurses talked. So far as there is a southern
dialect it is due to the modification of our language by the negro."

"You have mentioned several things," said Percy, "that are much to
the credit of the negro who has had a fair chance to be trained
along right lines; and I think the modficaton of our language which
his presence has brought about in the South is not without some
credit. It is generally agreed that the most pleasing English we
hear is that of the Southern orator.

"Referring to social conditions, the most marked difference which I
have noticed between the North and South, and really, it seems to
me, the only difference of importance, is that the South has
separate schools for white and colored, whereas in the North the
school is not looked upon as a social institution.

"As a rule no more objection is raised to white and colored children
sitting on separate seats in the same school room than to their
sitting on separate seats in the same street car. The school is
regarded as a place for work, where each has his own work to do,
much the same as in the shop or factory where both white and colored
are employed. The expense of the single school system is, of course,
much less than where separate schools are maintained; and perhaps an
equally important point is that in the single system the same moral
standards are held up by the teachers for both white and colored
children."

"That point is worthy of consideration," said Mr. West. "It is very
certain that a class of negroes has grown up in these more recent
years that was practically unknown in slave times when white men
were more largely responsible for their moral training. The vile
wretches who made the attack this evening probably never received
any moral training. It is conceivable that the moral influence of
the white children over the negroes in the same school might exert a
lasting benefit, even aside from the influence of the teacher; and
the relationship of the school room could not be any real
disadvantage to the white child. But this could only be brought
about where white teachers were employed. Some such arrangement
would doubtless have been made had the mind of Lincoln directed the
general policy of reconstruction; but it is doubtful now if the
negro teacher will ever be wholly replaced, although time has
wrought greater changes in political lines since the black years of
the reconstruction."

"Yes," said Percy, "and those changes which have been brought about
in the South have the full sympathy and approval of the great
majority of the Northern people. Indeed, it is extremely doubtful if
the North will be able to completely banish such a source of vice
and corruption as the open saloon until limitation is placed upon
the franchise by an educational qualification."






CHAPTER XI

JUDGMENT IS COME





THE goddess of sleep seemed to have deserted Westover. Adelaide lay
in her mother's arms, either awake and restless or in fitful sleep
from which she frequently awoke with a muffled scream or a physical
contortion. Once, as she nestled closer, her mother heard her
murmur: "You must pardon me."

Percy, from the southwest room, was sure he heard horses feet at the
side gate. The murmur of low voices reached his ear, and then he
recognized that horsemen were riding away.

The house was astir at early dawn; and as soon as breakfast was over
Mr. West had the colts hitched to the "buckboard" and he drove with
Percy to Montplain.

"I think your testimony will not be needed this morning," said Mr.
West, "but it may be needed later, and it is well that you should
report to the officers at any rate, since you promised to be there
this morning."

Percy pointed out the place where the attack had been made, and he
looked for a stump of a small tree or for any other object upon
which the negro could have fallen with such force as to mash his
eye; but he saw nothing.

As soon as they reached the village, Mr. West drove directly to the
town house; and there two black bodies were seen hanging from the
limb of an old tree in the courthouse yard. Percy noted that his
companion showed no sign of surprise; and, after the first shock of
his complete realization of the work of the night, he looked calmly
upon the scene. They had stopped almost under the tree.

"Are these the brutes who made the attack and whom you captured and
delivered to the officer?" asked Mr. West.

"They are," he replied.

"In your opinion have they received justice?"

"Yes, Sir," Percy replied, "but I fear without due process of law."

"Let me tell you, Sir, there is no law on the statutes under which
justice could be meted out to these devils for the nameless crime
which ends in death by murder or by suicide of the helpless victim,
a crime which these wretches committed only in their black
hearts--thanks to you, Sir."

As he spoke, the town marshall approached followed by the negro
pastor of the local church and a few of his followers. Silently they
lowered the bodies to the ground, placed them upon improvised
stretchers, and carried them to the potters field outside the
village, where rough coffins and graves were ready to receive them.

As Mr. West and Percy returned to Westover they discussed the lands
which in the main were lying abandoned on either side of the road.

"Here," said Mr. West, as he paused on the brow of a sloping
hillside, "was as near to Westover as the Union army came. The
position of the breastworks may still be seen. The Southern army lay
across the valley yonder. These two trees are sprouts from an old
stump of a tree that was shot away. About seventeen hundred
confederate dead were buried in trenches in the valley, but they
were later removed. The federal dead were carried away as the Union
army retreated. We never learned their number. For three days
Westover was made headquarters of the confederate officers, and my
mother worked day and night to prepare food for them."

They stopped at Westover for a few moments, Percy remaining in the
"buckboard" while Mr. West reported to his family what they had seen
in Montplain.

"Our report," said Mr. West, "hideous and horrible as it is, will
help to restore the child to calm and quiet. To speak frankly, Sir,
occurrences of this sort, sometimes with the worst results, are
sufficiently frequent in the South so that we constantly feel the
added weight or burden whenever the sister, wife, or daughter is
left without adequate protection."

The remaining hours of the morning were devoted to a drive over the
country surrounding Westover; and Mr. West consented to Adelaide's
request that she be allowed to drive Percy to the station at
Montplain, where he was to take the afternoon train for Richmond.
She chose the "buckboard" but insisted upon driving.

They talked of their school and college days, of the books they had
read, of anything in fact except of the experiences of the past
twenty-four hours. Even when they entered the valley no shadow
crossed Adelaide's face; but as they neared the station her voice
changed, and as Percy looked into her winsome, frankly upturned
face, she said:

"Have I truly been pardoned for my cruel words last evening? I am
sure you were as manly and noble as any man could have been."

"And I am sure you were the bravest little woman I have ever known,"
replied Percy, "and I admire you the more for calling me a coward
when you thought I was running away; so there is nothing to pardon I
am sure."

She gave him her hand as a child at parting, but he thought as he
looked into her eyes that he saw the soul of a woman.






CHAPTER XII

THE RESTORATION





PERCY carried with him a most interesting and attractive circular of
information concerning the rapid restoration of the farm lands of the
South. It also stated that further information could be secured from a
certain real estate agent in Richmond, who was found to be still in his
office when Percy arrived in the city late in the afternoon.

The agent was delighted to receive a call from the Western man, and
assured him that he would gladly show him several plantations not far
from the city which could be purchased at very reasonable prices. Indeed
he could have his choice of these old southern homesteads for the very
low price of forty dollars an acre. A map of an adjoining county showed
the exact location of several such farms, some of which were of great
historical interest. At what time in the morning could he be ready to be
shown one of these rare bargains?

"What treatment do these lands require to restore their productiveness?"
asked Percy.

"No treatment at all, Sir, except the adoption of your western methods
of farming and your system of crop rotation. I tell you the results are
marvelous when western farmers get hold of these famous old plantations.
Just good farming and a change of crops, that's all they need."

"Does clover grow well?" asked Percy. "We grow that a good deal in the
West."

"Oh, yes, clover will grow very well, indeed, but cowpeas is a much
better crop than clover. Our best farmers prefer the cowpea; and after a
crop of cowpeas, you can raise large crops of any kind."

"Of course you know of those who have been successful in restoring some
of these old farms," Percy suggested.

"Oh, yes, Sir, many of them, and they are making money hand over fist,
and their lands are increasing in value, and no doubt will continue to
increase just as your western lands have done. Yes, Sir, the greatest
opportunity for investment in land is right here and now, and these old
plantations are being snapped up very rapidly."

"I shall be glad to know of some of these successful farmers who are
using the improved methods. Will you name one, just as an example, and
tell me about what he has done to restore his land?"

"Well," said the agent, "There's T. O. Thornton, for example. Mr.
Thornton bought an old plantation of a thousand acres only six years ago
at a cost of six dollars an acre. He has been growing cowpeas in
rotation with other crops; and, as I say, he is making money hand over
fist. A few months ago he refused to consider fifty dollars an acre for
his land, but still there are some of these old plantations left that
can be bought for forty dollars, because the people don't really know
what they are worth. However, our lands are all much higher than they
were a few years ago."

"Where does Mr. Thornton live?" asked Percy.

"Oh, he lives at Blairville, nearly a hundred miles from Richmond. Yes,
he lives on his farm near Blairville. I tell you he's making good all
right, but I don't know of any land for sale in that section."

"I think I will go out to Blairville to see Mr. Thornton's farm," said
Percy. "Do you know when the trains run?"

"Well, I'm sorry to say that the train service is very poor to
Blairvile. There is only one train a day that reaches Blairville in
daylight, and that leaves Richmond very early in the morning."

"That is all right," said Percy, "it will probably get me there in time
so that I shall be sure to find Mr. Thornton at home. I thank you very
much, Sir. Perhaps I shall be able to see you again when I return from
Blairville."

"When you return from Blairville is about the most uncertain thing in
the world. As I said, the train service is mighty poor to Blairville,
and it's still poorer, you'll find, when you want to leave Blairville.
Why, a traveling man told me he had been on the road for fifteen years,
and he swore he had spent seven of 'em at Blairville waiting for trains.
Better take my advice and look over some of the fine old plantations
right here in the next county and then you can take all the rest of the
month if you wish getting in and out of Blairville."

About eight o'clock the following morning Percy might have been seen
walking along the railroad which ran through Mr. Thornton's farm about
two miles from Blairvile. He saw a well beaten path which led from the
railroad to a nearby cottage and a knock brought to the door a negro
woman followed by several children.

"Can you tell me where Mr. Thornton's farm is?" he inquired.

"Yes, Suh," she replied. "This is Mistah Tho'nton's place, right heah,
Suh. Leastways, it was his place; but we done bought twenty acahs of it
heah, wheah we live, 'cept tain all paid fo' yit. Mistah Tho'nton lives
in the big house over theah 'bout half a mile."

"May I ask what you have to pay for land here?"

"Oh, we have to pay ten dollahs an acah, cause we can't pay cash. My ol'
man he wo'ks on the railroad section and we just pay Mistah Tho'nton foh
dollahs every month. My chil'n wo'k in the ga'den and tend that acah
patch o' co'n."

"Do you fertilize the corn?"

"Yes, Suh. We can't grow nothin' heah without fe'tilizah. We got two
hundred pounds fo' three dollahs last spring and planted it with the
co'n."

As Percy turned in at Mr. Thornton's gate he saw a white man and two
negroes working at the barn. "Pardon me, but is this Mr. Thornton?"
asked Percy as he approached.

"That is my name."

"Well, my name is Johnston. I am especially interested in learning all I
can about the farm lands in this section and the best methods of
farming. I live in Illinois, and have thought some of selling our little
farm out there and buying a larger one here in the East where the land
is much cheaper than with us. A real estate agent in Richmond has told
me something of the progress you are making in the improvement of your
large farm. I hope you will not let me interfere with your work, Sir."

"Oh, this work is not much. I've had a little lumber sawed at a mill
which is running just now over beyond my farm, and I am trying to put a
shed up here over part of the barn yard so we can save more of the
manure. I shall be very glad to give you any information I can either
about my own farming or about the farm lands in this section."

"You have about a thousand acres in your farm I was told."

"Yes, we still have some over nine hundred acres in the place, but we
are farming only about two hundred acres, including the meadow and
pasture land. The other seven hundred acres are not fenced, and, as you
will see, the land is mostly grown up to scrub trees."

"Your corn appears to be a very good crop. About how many acres of corn
do you have this year?"

"I have only fourteen acres. That is all I could cover with manure, and
it is hardly worth trying to raise corn without manure."

"Do you use any commercial fertilizer?"

"Well, I've been using some bone meal. I've no use for the ordinary
complete commercial fertilizer. It sometimes helps a little for one
year; but it seems to leave the land poorer than ever. Bone meal lasts
longer and doesn't seem to hurt the land. I see from the agricultural
papers that some of the experiment stations report good results from the
use of fine-ground raw rock phosphate; but they advise using it in
connection with organic matter, such as manure or clover plowed under. I
am planning to get some and mix it with the manure here under this shed.
Do you use commercial fertilizers in Illinois?"

"Not to speak of, but some of our farmers are beginning to use the raw
phosphate. Our experiment station has found that our most extensive soil
types are not rich in phosphorus, and has republished for our benefit
the reports from the Maryland and Ohio experiment stations showing that
the fine-ground natural rock phosphate appears to be the most economical
form to be used and that it is likely to prove much more profitable in
the long run, although it may not give very marked results the first
year or two. May I ask what products you sell from your farm, Mr.
Thornton?"

"I sell cream. I have a special trade in Richmond, and I ship my cream
direct to the city. I also sell a few hogs and some wheat. I usually put
wheat after corn, and have fourteen acres of wheat seeded between the
corn shocks over there. Sometimes I don't get the wheat seeded, and then
I put the land in cowpeas. I usually raise about twenty-five acres of
cowpeas, and the rest of the cleared land I use for meadow and pasture.
I usually sow timothy after cowpeas, and I like to break up as much old
pasture land for corn as I can put manure on."

"I was told that you had been offered fifty dollars an acre for your
farm, Mr. Thornton, but that you would not consider the offer."

Mr. Thornton laughed heartily at this remark.

"That must have come from the Richmond land agent," he said. "Someone
else was telling me that story a short time ago. The fact is one of
those real estate agents was out here last spring and he asked me if I
would consider an offer of fifty dollars an acre for our land. I told
him that I didn't think that I would as long as any one who wishes to
buy can get all the land he wants in this section for five or ten
dollars an acre. That's as near as I came to having an offer of fifty
dollars an acre for this land. The land adjoining me on the south is is
for sale, and I am sure you could buy that farm of about seven hundred
acres for four dollars an acre after they get the timber off. Some of
the land has not been cropped for a hundred years, I guess; and there
are a few trees on it that are big enough for light saw-stuff. A man has
bought the timber that is worth cutting, and he is running a saw over
there now; but he'll get out all that's good for anything in a few
months."

"May I ask how long you have been farming here, Mr. Thornton?"

"Twelve years on this farm," he replied. "You see this estate was left
to my wife and her sister who still lives with us. We were married
twelve years ago and I have been working ever since to make a living for
us on this old worn-out farm. Of course I have made some little
improvements about the barns, but we've sold a little land too. The
railroad company wanted about an acre down where that little stream
crosses, for a water supply, and I got twelve hundred dollars for that."

"Now, I've already taken too much of your time," said Percy. "I thank
you for your kindness in giving me so much information. If there is no
objection I shall be glad to take a walk about over your farm and the
adjoining land, and perhaps I can see you again for a few moments when I
return."

"Certainly," Mr. Thornton replied. "There is no objection whatsoever. We
are going to Blairville this morning, but we shall be back before noon
and I shall be glad to see you then. I fear you have been given some
misinformation by the real estate agents. Some of them, by the way, are
Northern men who came down here and bought land and when they found they
could not make a living on it, they sold it to other land hunters, and I
suppose that they made so much in the deal that they stayed right here
as real estate agents. They are great advertisers; but I reckon our
Southern real estate men can just about keep even. The agent who was out
here last spring told me he showed one Northern man a farm for $12 an
acre and he was afraid to buy. Then he took him into another county and
showed him a poorer farm for $45 and he bought that at once.

"The road there runs out through the fields. Our land runs back to the
other public road and beyond that is the farm I told you of where the
saw mill is running. I've got some pretty good cowpeas you'll pass by. I
haven't got them off the racks yet."

Percy found the cowpea hay piled in large shocks over tripods made of
short stout poles which served to keep the hay off the ground to some
extent, and this permitted the cowpeas to be cured in larger piles and
with less danger of loss from molding.

"I find that the soil on your farm and on the other farm is very
generally acid," said Percy a few hours later when Mr. Thornton asked
what he thought of the condititons of farming. "Have you used any lime
for improving the soil?"

"Yes, I tried it about ten years ago, and it helped some, but not enough
to make it pay. I put ten barrels on about three acres. I thought it
helped the corn and wheat a little, and it showed right to the line
where I put cowpeas on the land, but I don't think it paid, and it's
mighty disagreeable stuff to handle."

"Do you remember how much it cost?" Percy asked.

"Yes, Sir. The regular price was a dollar a barrel, but by taking ten
barrels I got the ton for eight dollars; but I'd rather have eight
dollars' worth of bone meal."

"I think the lime would be a great help to clover," said Percy.

"Yes, that might be. They tell me that they used to grow lots of clover
here; but it played out completely, and nobody sows clover now, except
occasionally on an old feed lot which is rich enough to grow anything.
It takes mighty good land to grow clover; but cowpeas are better for us.
They do pretty well for this old land, only the seed costs too much, and
they make a sight of work, and they're mighty hard to get cured. You see
they aren't ready for hay till the hot weather is mostly past. If we
could handle them in June and July, as we do timothy we'd have no
trouble; but we don't get cowpeas planted till June, and September is a
poor time for haying."

"It seems to me that clover is a much more satisfactory crop," said
Percy. "One can sow clover with oats in the spring, or on wheat land in
the late winter, and there is no more trouble with it until it is ready
for haying about fifteen months later, unless the land is weedy or the
clover makes such a growth the first fall that we must clip it to
prevent either the weeds or the clover from seeding. This means that
when you are planting your ground for cowpeas the next year after wheat
or oats, we are just ready to begin harvesting our clover hay; and
besides the regular hay crop we usually have some growth the fall before
which is left on the land as a fertilizer, and then we get a second crop
of clover which we save either for hay or seed. Even after the seed crop
is harvested there is usually some later fall growth, and some let the
clover stand till it grows some more the next spring and then plow it
under for corn."

"I can see that clover would be much better than cowpeas if we could
grow it; but, as I said, it's played out here. Our land simply won't
grow it any more. Not having to plow for clover would save a great deal
of the work we must do for our cowpeas."

"Some of our farmers follow a three-year rotation and plow the ground
only once in three years," said Percy. "They plow the ground for corn,
disk it the next spring when oats and clover are seeded, and then leave
the land in clover the next year. In that way they regularly harvest
four crops, including the two clover crops, from only one plowing; and
in exceptional seasons I have known an extra crop of clover hay to be
harvested in the late fall on the land where the oats were grown.

"In regard to the lime question," Percy continued, "I wonder if you know
of the work the Pennsylvania Experiment Station has been doing with the
use of ground limestone in comparison with burned lime."

"No, I never heard of ground limestone being used. I supposed it had to
be burned. I should think it would be very expensive to grind
limestone."

"No, it costs much less to grind it than to burn it," Percy replied.
"Mills are used for grinding rock in cement manufacture, and the rock
phosphate and bone meal must all be ground before using them either for
direct application or for the manufacture of acidulated fertilizers; and
limestone is not so hard to grind as some other rocks. Furthermore it
does not need to be so very finely ground. If fine enough so that it
will pass through a sieve with ten meshes to the inch it does very well.
That you see would be a hundred meshes to the square inch; and, of
course, a great deal of it will be much finer than that. In fact the
ground limestone used in the Pennsylvania experiments was only fine
enough so that about ninety per cent. of it would pass a sieve with ten
meshes to the inch, and yet the limestone gave decidedly better results
than the burned lime, and it is not nearly so disagreeable to handle.
Besides this, the ground limestone is much less expensive. It can be
obtained at most points in Illinois for about a dollar and fifty cents a
ton."

"A dollar and fifty cents a ton!" exclaimed Mr. Thornton. "Well, that is
cheap, but how about the freight and the barrels and bags? Freight is a
big item with us."

"The dollar and fifty cents includes the freight," was the reply.

"Includes the cost and the freight both?"

"Yes, and the Illinois farmers have it shipped in bulk, so there is no
expense for barrels or bags. Of course the supplies of both coal and
limestone are very abundant, and with a well-equipped plant the actual
cost of grinding does not exceed twenty-five cents a ton. The original
cost of the material ground and on board cars at the works varies from
about sixty cents to one dollar a ton, and this leaves a very fair
margin of profit.

"The men who furnish the ground limestone realize that very large
quantities of it are needed if the soils of Illinois are to be kept
fertile, and they also realize that the ultimate prosperity of the
country depends upon agricultural prosperity. Their far-sightedness and
patriotism combine to lead them to try to sell carloads of limestone
instead of tons of burned lime. As a matter of fact five or ten dollars
profit on a car of limestone, the use of which in large quantities is
thus made possible in systems of positive soil improvement, is very much
better for all concerned than a profit of half that much on a single ton
of burned lime which is used as a soil stimulant in systems of soil
exhaustion."

"It is certainly true," said Mr. Thornton, "that all other great
industries depend upon agriculture, directly or indirectly. I have
thought of it many times. It seems to me that fishing is about the only
exception of importance."

Mr. Thornton requested that Percy remain for lunch in order that they
might return to the field to let him see the soil acidity tests made.






CHAPTER XIII

WHY PERCY WENT TO COLLEGE





"I AM interested to know where you learned these things about acid
soils and lime and limestone," said Mr. Thornton.

"Mostly in the agricultural college," replied Percy, "but much of
the information really comes from the investigations that are
conducted by the experiment stations. For example, the best
information the world affords concerning the comparative value of
burned lime and ground limestone is furnished by the Pennsylvania
Agricultural Experiment Station. Those experiments have been carried
on continuously since 1882, and the results of twenty years' careful
investigations have recently been published. A four-year rotation of
crops was practiced, including corn, oats, wheat, and hay, the hay
being clover and timothy mixed. With every crop the limestone has
given better results than the burned lime. In fact the burned lime
seems to have produced injurious results of late years, and the
analysis of the soil shows that there has been large loss of humus
and nitrogen where the burned lime has been used, the actual loss
being equivalent to the destruction of more than two tons of farm
manure per acre per annum."

"Well, we surely need this information," said Mr. Thornton. "I have
always supposed that the teachers in the agricultural college knew
little or nothing of practical farming."

"I did not go to college to learn practical farming, if we mean by
that the common practice of agriculture," replied Percy. "I already
knew what we call practical farming; that is, how to do the ordinary
farm work, including such operations as plowing, planting,
cultivating, and harvesting; but it seems to me, Mr. Thornton, that
this sort of practical farming has resulted in practical ruin for
most of these Eastern lands. The fact is there is a side to
agriculture that I knew almost nothing about as a so-called
practical farmer, and I am coming to believe that what we commonly
call practical farming is often the most impractical
farming,--certainly this is true if it ultimately results in
depleted and abandoned lands. The truly practical farmer is the man
who knows not only how to do, but also what to do and why he does
it. The Simplon railroad tunnel connecting Switzerland with Italy is
twelve miles long,--the longest in the world. It was dug from the
two ends, but under the mountain, six miles from either end, the two
holes came together exactly, within a limit of error of less than
six inches, and made one continuous tunnel twelve miles long. Now,
this was not all accomplished by the practical men who knew how to
handle a spade in digging a ditch. The work was controlled by
science, and it was known in advance what the results would be. I do
not mean that it was known how hard the digging would be, nor how
much trouble would be caused by caving or by water; but it was known
that if the practical work was done, the final outcome would be
successful.

"I think it is even more important that we understand enough of the
sciences which underlie the practice of agriculture so we may know
in advance that when the practical farm work is done the soil will
be richer and better rather than poorer and less productive because
of our impractical farming.

"As I said, I did not go to the agricultural college to learn the
practice or art of farming; I went to learn the science of
agriculture; but, as a matter of fact, I found the college professor
knew about as much of practical agriculture as I did and a great
deal of science that I did not know. I found that the Dean of the
college, who is also Director of the Experiment Station, had been
born and raised on the farm, had done all kinds of farm work, the
same as other farm boys, had gone through an agricultural college,
and after his graduation had returned to the farm and remained there
for ten years doing his own work with his own hands. He has had as
much actual farm experience as you have had, Mr. Thornton, and ten
years more than I have had. He was finally called from the farm to
become an assistant in the college from which he was graduated, and
in a few years he was advanced to head professor in agriculture.
About ten years ago he was made dean and director of the
agricultural college and experiment station in my own state; and I
have been told that he will not recommend any one for a responsible
position in an agricultural college unless he has had both farm
experience and scientific training. He and most of his associates
are owners of farms and would return to them again if they did not
feel that they are of more service to agriculture as teachers and
investigators."

"I am very glad to know about this," said Mr. Thornton. "Certainly
your opinion, based upon such knowledge as you have of your own
college, is worth more than all the common talk I have ever heard
from those who never saw an agricultural college. I wish you would
tell me something more in regard to what crops are made of and about
the methods of making land better even while we are taking crops
from it every year."






CHAPTER XIV

A LESSON IN FARM SCIENCE





"THE subject is somewhat complicated," Percy replied, "yet it
involves no more difficult problems than have been solved in many
other lines. The chief trouble is that we have done too little
thinking about our own real problems. Even in the country schools we
have learned something of banking and various other lines of
business, something of the history and politics of this and other
countries, something of the great achievements in war, in discovery
and exploration, in art, literature, and invention; but we have not
learned what our soils contain nor what our crops require. Not one
farmer in a hundred knows what chemical elements are absolutely
required for the production of our agricultural plants, and one may
work hard on the farm from four o'clock in the morning till nine
o'clock at night for forty years and still not learn what corn is
made of.

"All agricultural plants are composed of ten chemical elements, and
the growth of any crop is absolutely dependent upon the supply of
these plant food elements. If the supply of any one of these plant
food elements is limited, the crop yield will also be limited. The
grain and grass crops, such as corn, oats, wheat, and timothy, also
the root crops and potatoes, secure two elements from the air, one
from water, and seven from the soil.

"The supply of some elements is constantly renewed by natural
processes, and iron, one of the ten, is contained in all normal
soils in absolutely inexhaustible amount; while other elements
become deficient and the supply must be renewed by man, or crop
yields decrease and farming becomes unprofitable.

"Matter is absolutely indestructible. It may change its form, but
not a pound of material substance can be destroyed. Matter moves in
cycles, and the key to the problem of successful permanent
agriculture is the circulation of plant food. While some elements
have a natural cycle which is amply sufficient to meet all
requirements for these elements as plant food, other elements have
no such cycle, and it is the chief business of the farmer to make
these elements circulate.

"Take carbon, for example. This element is well represented by hard
coal. Soft coal and charcoal are chiefly carbon. The diamond is pure
crystallized carbon, and charcoal made from pure sugar is pure,
uncrystallized carbon. This can easily be made by heating a lump of
sugar on a red hot stove until only a black coal remains. Now these
different solid materials represent carbon in the elemental form or
free state. But carbon may unite with other elements to form
chemical compounds, and these may be solids, liquids, gases.

"Thus carbon and sulfur are both solid elements, one black and the
other yellow, as generally found. If these two elements are mixed
together under ordinary conditions no change occurs. The result is
simply a mixture of carbon and sulfur. But, if this mixture is
heated in a retort which excludes the air, the carbon and sulfur
unite into a chemical compound called carbon disulfid. This compound
is neither black, yellow, nor solid; but it is a colorless, limpid
liquid; and yet it contains absolutely nothing except carbon and
sulfur."

"That seems strange," remarked Mr. Thornton. "Yes, but similar
changes are going on about us all the time," replied Percy. "We put
ten pounds of solid black coal in the stove and an hour later we
find nothing there, except a few ounces of ashes which represent the
impurities in the coal."

"Well, the coal is burned up and destroyed, is it not?"

"The carbon is burned and changed, but not destroyed. In this case,
the heat has caused the carbon to unite with the element oxygen
which exists in the air in the form of a gas, and a chemical
compound is formed which we call carbon dioxid. This compound is a
colorless gas. This element oxygen enters the vent of the stove and
the compound carbon dioxid passes off through the chimney. If there
is any smoke, it is due to small particles of unburned carbon or
other colored substances.

"As a rule more or less sulfur is contained in coal, wood, and other
organic matter, and this also is burned to sulfur dioxid and carried
into the air, from which it is brought back to the soil in rain in
ample amounts to supply all of the sulfur required by plants.

"Everywhere over the earth the atmosphere contains some carbon
dioxid and this compound furnishes all agricultural plants their
necessary supply of both carbon and oxygen. In other words, these
are the two elements that plants secure from the air. The gas,
carbon dioxid, passes into the plant through the breathing pores on
the under side of the leaves. These are microscopic openings but
very numerous. A square inch of a corn leaf may have a hundred
thousand breathing pores."

"Now, as we go on, I am especially anxious to get at this question
of supply and demand," said Mr. Thornton. "I think I understand
about iron and sulfur, and also that these two elements, carbon and
oxygen, are both contained in the air in the compound called carbon
dioxid, and that this must supply our crops with those two elements
of plant food. I'd like to know about the supply. How much is there
in the air and how much do the crops require?"

"As you know," said Percy, "the atmospheric pressure is about
fifteen pounds to the square inch."

"Yes, I've heard that, I know."

"Well, that means, of course, that there are fifteen pounds of air
resting on every square inch of the earth's surface; in other words,
that a column of air one inch square and as high as the air goes,
perhaps fifty miles or more, weighs fifteen pounds."

"Yes, that is very clear."

"There is only one pound of carbon in ten thousand pounds of
ordinary country air. Now, there are one hundred and sixty square
rods in an acre, and since there are twelve inches in a foot and
sixteen and one-half feet in a rod, it is easy to compute that there
are nearly a hundred million pounds of air on an acre, and that the
carbon in this amounts to only five tons. A three-ton crop of corn
or hay contains one and one-fourth tons of the element carbon; so
that the total amount of the carbon in the air over an acre of land
is sufficient for only four such crops; while a single crop of corn
yielding a hundred bushels to the acre, such as we often raise in
Illinois on old feed-lots or other pieces of well treated land would
require half of the total supply of carbon contained in the air over
an acre. However, the largest crop of corn ever grown, of which
there is an established authentic record, was not raised in
Illinois, but in the state of South Carolina, in the county of
Marlborough, in the year 1898, by Z. J. Drake; and, according to the
authentic report of the official committee that measured the land
and saw the crop harvested and weighed, and awarded Drake a prize of
five hundred dollars given by the Orange Judd Publishing
Company,--according to this very creditable evidence, that acre of
land yielded 239 bushels of thoroughly aid-dried corn; and such a
crop, Mr. Thornton, would require as much carbon as the total amount
contained in the air over an acre of land."

"Well, that is astonishing! Then there must be some other source of
supply besides the air."

"There is no other direct source from which plants secure carbon;
but of course the air is in constant motion. Only one-fourth of the
earth's surface is land, and perhaps only one-fourth of this land is
cropped, and the average crop is about one-fourth of three tons; so
that the total present supply of carbon in the air would be
sufficient for about two hundred and fifty years. But as a matter of
fact the supply is permanently maintained by the carbon cycle. Thus
the carbon of coal that is burned in the stove returns to the air in
carbon dioxid; and all combustion of coal and wood, grass and weeds,
and all other vegetable matter returns carbon to the atmosphere. All
decay of organic matter, as in the fermentation of manure in the
pile and the rotting of vegetable matter in the soil, is a form of
slow combustion and carbon dioxid is the chief produce of such
decay. Sometimes an appreciable amount of heat is developed, as in
the steaming pile of stable refuse lying in the barnyard, while the
heat evolved in the soil is too quickly disseminated to be apparent.

"In addition to all this, every animal exhales carbon dioxid. The
body heat and the animal force or energy are supplied by the
combustion of organic food within the body, and here, too, carbon
dioxid is the chief product of combustion.

"Thus, as a general average, the amount of carbon removed from the
atmosphere by growing plants is no greater than the amount returned
to the air by these various forms of combustion or decay. In like
manner the supply of combined oxygen is maintained, both carbon and
oxygen being furnished to the plant m the carbon dioxid.

"As a matter of fact, the air consists very largely of oxygen and
nitrogen, both in the free state, but in this form these elements
cannot be utilized in the growth of agricultural plants. The only
apparent exception to this is in case of legume crops, such as
clover, alfalfa, peas, beans, and vetch, which have power to utilize
the free nitrogen by means of their symbiotic relationship with
certain nitrogen-fixing bacteria which live, or may live, in
tubercles on their roots.

"Carbon and oxygen constitute about ninety per cent. of the dry
matter of ordinary farm crops, and with the addition of hydrogen
very important plant constituents are produced; such as starch,
sugar, fiber, or cellulose, which constitute the carbohydrate group.
As the name indicates, this group contains carbon, hydrogen, and
oxygen, the last two being present in the same proportion as in
water.

"Water is composed of the two elements, hydrogen and oxygen, both of
which are gases in the free state. Water is taken into the plant
through the roots and decomposed in the leaves in contact with the
carbon dioxid under the influence of sunlight and the life
principle. The oxygen from the water and part of that from the
carbon dioxid is given off into the air through the breathing pores,
while the carbon, hydrogen, and part of the oxygen, unite to form
the carbohydrates. These three elements constitute about ninety-five
per cent. of our farm crops, and yet every one of the other seven
plant food elements is just as essential to the growth and full
development of the plant as are these three."

"Then so long as we have air above and moisture below, our crops
will not lack for carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen. Is that the summing
up of the matter?"

"Yes, Sir," Percy replied.

"And those three elements make up ninety-five per cent. of our farm
crops. Is that correct?"

"Yes, Sir, as an average."

"Well, now it seems to me, if nature thus provides ninety-five per
cent. of all we need, we ought to find some way of furnishing the
other five per cent. It makes me think of the young wife who told
her husband she could live on bread and water, with his love, and he
told her that if she would furnish the bread he'd skirmish around
and get the water. But, say, did that South Carolina man use any
fertilizer for that immense crop of corn?"

"Some fertilizer, yes. He applied manure and fertilizer from
February till June. In all he applied 1000 bushels (about 30 tons)
of farm manure, 600 bushels of whole cotton seed, 900 pounds of
cotton seed meal, 900 pounds of kainit, 1100 pounds of guano, 200
pounds of bone meal, 200 pounds of acid phosphate, and 400 pounds of
sodium nitrate."

"I would also like to know the facts about this nitrogen business,"
said Mr. Thornton. "I've understood that one could get some of it
from the air, and I would much rather get it that way than to buy it
from the fertilizer agent at twenty cents a pound. Cowpeas don't
seem to help much, and we don't have the cotton seed, and we never
have sufficient manure to cover much land."

"It is a remarkable fact," said Percy, "that of the ten essential
elements of plant food, nitrogen is the most abundant, measured by
crop requirements, and at the same time the most expensive. The air
above an acre of land contains enough carbon for a hundred bushels
of corn per acre for two years, and enough nitrogen for five hundred
thousand years; and yet the nitrogen in commercial fertilizers costs
from fifteen to twenty cents a pound. At commercial prices for
nitrogen, every man who owns an acre of land is a millionaire.

"You mean he has millions in the air," amended Mr. Thornton.

"Yes, that is the better way to put it," Percy admitted, "but the
fact is he can not only get this nitrogen for nothing by means of
legume crops, but he is paid for getting it, because those crops are
profitable to raise for their own value. Clover, alfalfa, cowpeas,
and soy beans are all profitable crops, and they all have power to
use the free nitrogen of the air.

"There are a few important facts to be kept in mind regarding
nitrogen:

"A fifty-bushel crop of corn takes 75 pounds of nitrogen from the
soil. Of this amount about 50 pounds are in the grain, 24 pounds are
in the stalks, and 1 pound in the cobs. A fifty-bushel crop of oats
takes 48 pounds of nitrogen from the soil, 33 pounds in the grain,
and 15 in the straw. A twenty-five bushel crop of wheat also takes
48 pounds of nitrogen from the soil, 36 pounds in the grain and 12
in the straw.

"These amounts will vary to some extent with the quality of the
crops, just as the weight of a bushel of wheat varies from perhaps
56 to 64 pounds, although as an average wheat weighs 60 pounds to
the bushel."

"You surely remember figures well," remarked Mr. Thornton as he made
some notations.

"It is easy to remember what we think about much and often," said
Percy; "as easy to remember that a ton of cowpea hay contains 43
pounds of nitrogen as that Blairville is 53 miles from Richmond."

"I have added those figures together," continued Mr. Thornton, "and
I find that the three crops, corn, oats, and wheat, would require
171 pounds of nitrogen. Now suppose we raise a crop of cowpeas the
fourth year, how much nitrogen would be added to the soil in the
roots and stubble?"

"Not any."

"Do you mean to say that the roots and stubble of the cowpeas would
add no nitrogen to the soil? Surely that does not agree with the
common talk."

"It is even worse than that," said Percy. "The cowpea roots and
stubble would contain less nitrogen than the cowpea crop takes from
a soil capable of yielding thirty bushels of corn or oats. Only
about one-tenth of the nitrogen contained in the cowpea plant is
left in the roots and stubble when the crop is harvested. Suppose
the yield is two tons per acre of cowpea hay! Such a crop would
contain about 86 pounds of nitrogen, and about 10 pounds of nitrogen
per acre would be left in the roots and stubble."

"Well, that wouldn't go far toward replacing the 171 pounds removed
from the soil by the corn, oats, and wheat, that's sure," was Mr.
Thornton's comment.

"It is worse than that," Percy repeated. "Land that will furnish 48
pounds of nitrogen for a crop of oats or wheat will furnish more
than 10 pounds for a crop of cowpeas. At the end of such a four-year
rotation such a soil would be about 200 pounds poorer in nitrogen
per acre than at the beginning, if all crops were removed and
nothing returned."

"How much would it cost to put that nitrogen back in commercial
fertilizer?" asked Mr. Thornton.

"That depends, of course, upon what kind of fertilizer is used."

"Well, most people around here who use fertilizer buy what the agent
calls two-eight-two, and its costs about one dollar and fifty cents
a hundred pounds; but it can be bought by the ton for about
twenty-five dollars."

"'Two-eight-two' means that the fertilizer is guaranteed to contain
two per cent. of ammonia, eight per cent. of available 'phosphoric
acid,' and two per cent. of potash."

"Ammonia is the same as nitrogen, is it not?"

"No, it is not the same," replied Percy. "Ammonia is a compound of
nitrogen and hydrogen. In order to have a clear understanding of the
relation between ammonia and nitrogen we only need to know the
combining weights of the elements. The smallest particle of an
element is called an atom. Hydrogen is the lightest of all the
elements and the weight of the hydrogen atom is used as the standard
or unit for the measure of all other atomic weights; thus the atom
of hydrogen weighs one."

"One what?" interrupted Mr. Thornton.

"No one knows," replied Percy. "The atom is extremely small, much
too small to be seen with the most powerful microscope; but you know
all things are relative and we always measure one thing in terms of
another. We say a foot is twelve inches and an inch is one-twelfth
of a foot, and there we stop with a definition of each expressed in
terms of the other, and both depending upon an arbitrary standard
that somebody once adopted; and yet, while the foot is known in most
countries, it is rare that two countries have exactly the same
standard for this measure of length.

"We do not know the exact weight of the hydrogen atom, but we do
know its relative weight. If the hydrogen atom weighs one then other
atomic weights are as follows:

12 for carbon
14 for nitrogen
16 for oxygen
24 for magnesium
31 for phosphorus
32 for sulfur
39 for potassium
40 for calcium
56 for iron

"This means that the iron atom is fifty-six times as heavy as the
hydrogen atom. These atomic weights are absolutely necessary to a
clear understanding of the compounds formed by the union or
combination of two or more elements.

"One other thing is also necessary. That is to keep in mind the
number of bonds, or hands, possessed by each atom. The atom of
hydrogen has only one hand, and the same is true of potassium. Each
atom of oxygen has two hands; so that one oxygen atom can hold two
hydrogen atoms in the chemical compound called water (H-O-H or H20).
Other elements having two-handed atoms are magnesium and calcium.
Strange to say, the sulfur atom has six hands but sometimes uses
only two, the others seemingly being clasped together in pairs. I
will write it out for you, thus:

Hydrogen sulfid: H-S-H or H2S

Sulfur dioxid: O=S=0 or S02

"The carbon atom has four hands, and atoms of nitrogen and
phosphorus have five hands, but sometimes use only three. Thus, in
the compound called ammonia, one atom of nitrogen always holds three
atoms of hydrogen; so, if you buy seventeen pounds of ammonia you
would get only fourteen pounds of nitrogen and three pounds of
hydrogen. This means that, if the two-eight-two fertilizer contains
two per cent. of ammonia, it contains only one and two-thirds per
cent. of the actual element nitrogen, and a ton of such fertilizer
would contain thirty-three pounds of nitrogen. In other words it
would take six tons of such fertilizer to replace the nitrogen
removed from one acre of land in four years if the crop yields were
fifty bushels of corn and oats, twenty-five bushels of wheat, and
two tons of cowpea hay."

"Six tons! Why, that would cost a hundred and fifty dollars! Well,
well, I thought I knew we couldn't afford to keep up our land with
commercial fertilizer; but I didn't think it was that bad. Almost
forty dollars an acre a year!"

"It need not be quite that bad," said Percy. "You see this
two-eight-two fertilizer contains eight per cent. of so-called
'phosphoric acid' and two per cent. of potash, and those
constituents may be worth much more than the nitrogen; but, so far
as nitrogen is concerned, the two hundred pounds would cost from
thirty to forty dollars in the best nitrogen fertilizers in the
market, such as dried blood or sodium nitrate."

"Well, even that would be eight or ten dollars a year per acre, and
that is as much as the land is worth, and this wouldn't include any
other plant food elements, such as 'phosphoric acid' and potash."

"No, that much would be required for the nitrogen alone if bought in
commercial form. I understand that the farmers who use this common
commercial fertilizer, apply about three hundred pounds of it to the
acre perhaps twice in four years. That would cost about eight
dollars for the four years, and the total nitrogen applied in the
two applications would amount to 10 pounds per acre."

"It is not quite correct to call 'phosphoric acid' and potash plant
food elements. They are not elements but compounds."

"Like ammonia, which is part nitrogen and part hydrogen?"

"The problem is somewhat similar, but not just the same," Percy
replied. "These compounds contain oxygen and not hydrogen."

"Well, I understand that both oxygen and hydrogen are furnished by
natural processes, the oxygen from carbon dioxid in the carbon
cycle, and the hydrogen from the water which falls in rain."

"That is all true, but you really do not buy the hydrogen or oxygen.
While they are included in the two-eight-two guarantee, the price is
adjusted for that. Thus the cost of nitrogen would be just the same
whether you purchase the fertilizer on the basis of seventeen cents
a pound for the actual element nitrogen, or fourteen cents a pound
for the ammonia."

"Yes, I see how that might be, but I don't see why the guarantee
should be two per cent. of ammonia instead of one and two-thirds per
cent. of nitrogen, when the nitrogen is all that gives it value."

"There is no good reason for it," said Percy. "It is one of those
customs that are conceived in ignorance and continued in
selfishness. It is very much simpler to consider the whole subject
on the basis of actual plant food elements, and I am glad to say
that many of the state laws already require the nitrogen to be
guaranteed in terms of the actual element, a few states now require
the phosphorus and potassium also to be reported on the element
basis."

"That is hopeful, at least," said Mr. Thornton. "Now, if I am not
asking too many questions or keeping you here too long, I shall be
glad to have you explain two more points that come to my mind:
First, how much of that two hundred pounds of nitrogen can I put
back in the manure produced on the farm; and, second, just what is
meant by potash and phosphoric acid?"

Percy made a few computations and then replied: "If you sell the
wheat; feed all the corn, oats, and cowpea hay and half of the straw
and corn fodder, and use the other half for bedding; and, if you
save absolutely all of the manure produced, including both the solid
and liquid excrement; then it would be possible to recover and
return to the land about 173 pounds of nitrogen during the four
years, compared with the 200 pounds taken from the soil."

"I can't understand that," said Mr. Thornton. "How can that be when
one of the crops is cowpeas?"

"In average live-stock and dairy farming," Percy continued, "about
one-fourth of the nitrogen contained in the food consumed is
retained in the milk and animal growth, and you can make the
computations for yourself. It should be kept in mind, moreover, that
much of the manure produced on the average farm is wasted. More than
half of the nitrogen is in the liquid excrement, and it is extremely
difficult to prevent loss of the liquid manure. There is also large
loss of nitrogen from the fermentation of manure in piles; and when
you smell ammonia in the stable, see the manure pile steaming, or
colored liquid soaking into the ground beneath, or flowing away in
rainy weather, you may know that nitrogen is being lost. How many
tons of manure can you apply to your land under such a system of
farming as we have been discussing?"

"Well, I've figured a good deal on manure," was the reply, "and I
think with four fields producing such crops as you counted on, that
I could possibly put ten or twelve tons to the acre on one field
every year."

"That would return from 100 to 120 pounds of nitrogen;" said Percy,
"instead of the 173 pounds possible to be returned if there is no
loss. There are three methods that may be used to reduce the loss of
manure: One of these is to do the feeding on the fields. Another is
to haul the manure from the stable every day or two and spread it on
the land. The third is to allow the manure to accumulate in deep
stalls for several weeks, using plenty of bedding to absorb the
liquid and keep the animals clean, and then haul and spread it when
convenient."

"I'm afraid that last method would not do at all for the dairy
farmer," said Mr. Thornton. "You see we have to keep things very
clean and in sanitary condition."

"Most often the cleanest and most sanitary method the average farmer
has of handling the manure in dairying," said Percy, "is to keep it
buried as much as possible under plenty of clean bedding; and one of
the worst methods is to overhaul it every day by 'cleaning' the
stable, unless you could have concrete floors throughout, and flush
them well once or twice a day, thus losing a considerable part of
the valuable excrement. If you allow the manure to accumulate for
several weeks at a time, it is best to have sufficient room in the
stable or shed so that the cows need not be tied. If allowed to run
loose they will find clean places to lie down even during the night.

"In case of horses, the manure can be kept buried for several weeks
if some means are used to prevent the escape of ammonia. Cattle
produce what is called a 'cold' manure, while it is called 'hot'
from horses because it decomposes so readily. One of the best
substances to use for the prevention of loss of ammonia in horse
stables is acid phosphate, which has power to unite with ammonia and
hold it in a fixed compound. About one pound of acid phosphate per
day for each horse should be sprinkled over the manure. Of course
the phosphorus contained in the acid phosphate has considerable
value for its own sake, and care should be taken that you do not
lose more phosphorus from the acid phosphate applied than the value
of all the ammonia saved by this means. Porous earth floors may
absorb very considerable amounts of liquid from wet manure lying
underneath the dry bedding, and the acid phosphate sometimes injures
the horses' feet; so that, as a rule, it is better to clean the
horse stables every day and supply phosphorus in raw phosphate at
one-fourth of its cost in acid phosphate."

"Before we leave the nitrogen question," said Mr. Thornton, "I want
to ask if you can suggest how we can get enough of the several
million dollars' worth we have in the air to supply the needs of our
crops and build up our land?"

"Grow more legumes, and plow more under, either directly or in
manure."

"That sounds easy, but can you suggest some practical system?"

"I think so. I know too little of your conditions to think I could
suggest the best system for you to adopt; but I can surely suggest
one that will supply nitrogen for such crop yields as we have
considered: Suppose we change the order of the crops and grow wheat,
corn, oats, and cowpeas, and grow clover with the wheat and oats,
plowing the clover under in the spring as green manure for corn and
cowpeas. If necessary to prevent the clover or weeds from producing
seed, the field may be clipped with the mower in the late summer
when the clover has made some growth after the wheat and oats have
been removed. Leave this season's growth lying on the land. As an
average it should amount to more than half a ton of hay per acre.
The next spring the clover is allowed to grow for several weeks. It
should be plowed under for corn on one field early in May and two or
three weeks later the other field is plowed for cowpeas. The spring
growth should average nearly a ton of clover hay per acre. In this
way clover equivalent to about three tons of hay could be plowed
under. Clover hay contains 40 pounds of nitrogen per ton; so this
would supply about 120 pounds of nitrogen in addition to the 173
pounds possible to be supplied in the manure. This would make
possible a total return of 293 pounds, while we figured some 200
pounds removed. Of course if you save only 100 pounds in the manure
the amount returned would be reduced to 220 pounds."

"There are two questionable points in this plan," said Mr. Thornton,
" one is the impossibility, or at least the difficulty, of growing
clover on this land. The other point is, How much of that 120 pounds
of nitrogen returned in the clover is taken from the soil itself? I
remember you figured 86 pounds of nitrogen in two tons of cowpea
hay, but you also assumed that about 29 pounds of it would be taken
from the soil."

"Yes, that is true," Percy replied, "at least 29 pounds and
probably more. You see the cowpeas grow during the same months as
corn and on land prepared in about the same manner. If the soil will
furnish 75 pounds of nitrogen to the corn crop, and 48 pounds to the
oats and wheat, it would surely furnish 29 pounds to the cowpeas. Of
course this particular amount has no special significance, but the
other definite amounts removed in corn, oats, and wheat aggregate
171 and the 29 pounds were added to make the round 200 pounds.
Perhaps 210 pounds would be nearer the truth, in which case the soil
would furnish about half as much nitrogen to the cowpea crop as to
the corn crop. This is reasonable considering that corn is the first
crop grown after the manure is applied. You will remember that only
one-tenth of the total nitrogen of the cowpea plant remains in the
roots and stubble?"

"Yes, that's what we figured on."

"The cowpea is an annual plant. It is planted, produces its seed,
and dies the same season. It has no need to store up material in the
roots for future use. Consequently the substance of the root is
largely taken into the tops as the plan approaches maturity. It is
different with the clover plant. This is a biennial with some
tendency toward the perennial plant. It lives long and develops an
extensive root system, and its stores up material in the roots
during part of its life for use at a later period. About one-third
of the total nitrogen content of the clover plant is contained in
the roots and stubble. This means that the roots and stubble of a
two-ton crop of clover would contain about forty pounds of nitrogen,
or more than we assumed was taken from the soil by the cowpeas. But
there is still another point in favor of the clover. The cowpeas
make their growth during the summer months when nitrification is
most active, whereas the clover growth we have counted on occurs
chiefly during the fall and spring when nitrification is much less
active, consequently the clover probably takes even a larger
proportion of its nitrogen from the air than we have counted on."

"That is rather confusing," said Mr. Thornton, "you say the cowpea
grows when nitrification is most active, and yet you say that it
takes less nitrogen from the air than clover. Isn't that somewhat
contradictory?"

"I think not," said Percy." Let me see.--Just what do you understand
by nitrification?"

"Getting nitrogen from the air, is it not?"

"No, no. That explains it. Getting nitrogen from the air is called
nitrogen fixation. This action is carried on by the nitrogen-fixing
bacteria, such as the clover bacteria, the soy bean bacteria, the
alfalfa bacteria, which, by the way, are evidently the same as the
bacteria of sweet clover, or mellilotus. Then we also have the
cowpea bacteria, and these seem to be the same as the bacteria of
the wild partridge pea, a kind of sensitive plant with yellow
flowers, and a tiny goblet standing upright at the base of each
compound leaf,--the plant called Cassia Chamaecrista by the
botanist."

"Nitrification is an altogether--"

"Well, I declare! Excuse me, Sir, but that's Charlie calling the
cows. Scotts, I don't see where the time has gone! You'll excuse me,
Sir, but I must look after separating the cream. You will greatly
oblige me, Mr. Johnston, if you will have dinner with us and share
our home to-night. In addition to the pleasure of your company, I
confess that I am mightily interested in this subject; and I would
like especially to get a clear understanding of that nitrification
process, and we've not had time to discuss the potash and
'phosphoric acid,' which I know cost some of our farmers a good part
of all they get for their crops, and still their lands are as poor
as ever."

"I appreciate very much your kind invitation, Mr. Thornton. I came
to you for correct information regarding the agricultural conditions
here, and you were very kind and indulgent to answer my blunt
questions, even concerning your own farm practice and experience. I
feel, Sir, that I am already greatly indebted to you, but it will
certainly be a great pleasure to me to remain with you to-night."

For more than two hours they had been standing, leaning, or sitting
in a field beside a shock of cowpea hay, Percy toying with his soil
auger, and Mr. Thornton making records now and then in his pocket
note book.






CHAPTER XV

COEDUCATION





PERCY took a lesson in turning the cream separator and after dinner
Mrs. Thornton assured him that she and her sister were greatly
disappointed that they had not been permitted to hear the discussion
concerning the use of science on the farm.

"We have never forsaken our belief that these old farms can again be
made to yield bountiful crops," she said, "as ours did for so many
years under the management of our ancestors. 'Hope springs eternal
in the human breast.' I stop with that for I do not like the rest of
the couplet. We can see that some marked progress has been made
under my husband's management, although he feels that it is very
slow work building up a run-down farm. But he has raised some fine
crops on the fields under cultivation,--as much as ten barrels of
corn to the acre, have you not, Dear?" she asked.

"Yes, fully that much, but even ten barrels per acre on one small
field is nothing compared to the great fields of corn Mr. Johnston
raises in the West. and it makes a mighty small show here on a
nine-hundred-acre farm, most of which hasn't been cropped for more
than twenty years; and even then it was given up because the negro
tenants couldn't raise corn enough to live on.

"I've talked some with the fertilizer agents, but they don't know
much about fertilizers, except what they read in the testimonials
published in the advertising booklets. I have had some good help
from the agricultural papers, but most that is written for the
papers doesn't apply to our farm, and it's so indefinite and
incomplete, that I've just spent this whole evening asking Mr.
Johnston questions; and I haven't given him a chance to answer them
all yet."

"I am sure you have not asked more questions this afternoon than I
did this forenoon," Percy remarked; "and all your answers were based
on authentic history or actual experience, while my answers were
only what I have learned from others."

"Well, if we were more ready to learn from others, it would be
better for all of us," said Mr. Thornton. "Experience is a mighty
dear teacher and, even if we finally learn the lesson, it may be too
everlasting late for us to apply it. Now we all want to learn about
that process called nitrification."

"It is an extremely interesting and important process," said Percy.
"It includes the stages or steps by which the insoluble organic
nitrogen of the soil is converted into soluble nitrate nitrogen, in
which form it become available as food for all of our agricultural
plants."

"Excepting the legumes?" asked Mr. Thornton.

"Excepting none," Percy replied. "The legume plants, like clover,
take nitrogen from the soil so far as they can secure it in
available form, and in this respect clover is not different from
corn. The respect in which it is different is the power of clover to
secure additional supplies of nitrogen from the air when the soil's
available supply becomes inadequate to meet the needs of the growing
clover. If the conditions are suitable for nitrogen-fixation, then
the growth of the legume plants need not be limited by lack of
nitrogen; whereas, nitrogen is probably the element that first
limits the growth and yield of all other crops on your common
soils."

"Now, what do you think of that, Girls? With millions of dollars'
worth of nitrogen in the air over every acre, our crops are poor
just because we don't use it. I wish you would tell me something
about the suitable conditions for nitrogen-fixation, Mr. Johnston.
You understand, Girls, that nitrogen-fixation is simply getting
nitrogen from the inexhaustible supply in the air by means of little
microscopic organisms called bacteria, which live in little balls
called tubercles attached to the roots of certain plants called
legumes, like cowpeas and clover. Corn and wheat and such crops
can't get this nitrogen. Now, Mr. Johnston is telling about
nitrification, a process which is entirely different from
nitrogen-fixation. Excuse me, Mr. Johnston, but I wanted to make
this plain to Mrs. Thornton and Miss Russell."

"I am glad you did so," Percy replied. "As I was saying,
nitrification has no connection whatever with the free nitrogen of
the air.

"All plants take their food in solution; that is, the plant food
taken from the soil must be dissolved in the soil water or moisture.
Of the essential elements of plant food, seven are taken from the
soil through the roots into the plant. These seven do not include
those of which water itself is composed. Now, these seven plant food
elements exist in the soil almost exclusively in an insoluble form.
In that condition they are not available to the plant for plant
food; and it is the business of the farmer to make this plant food
available as fast as is needed by his growing crops.

"The nitrogen of the soil exists in the organic matter; that is, in
such materials as plant roots, weeds, and stubble, that may have
been plowed under, or any kind of vegetable maker incorporated with
the soil, including all sorts of crop residues, green manures, and
the common farm fertilizers from the stables. When these organic
materials are decomposed and disintegrated to such an extent that
their structure is completely destroyed, the resulting mass of
partially decayed black organic matter is called humus. The nitrogen
of the soil is one of the constituents of this humus or other
organic matter. It is not contained in the mineral particles of the
soil. On the other hand the other six elements of plant food are
contained largely in the mineral part of the soil, as the clay,
silt, and sand. thus the iron, calcium, magnesium, and potassium,
all of which are called abundant elements, are contained in the
mineral matter, and usually in considerable amounts, while they are
found in the organic matter in very small proportion. The phosphorus
and sulfur are found in very limited quantities in most soils, but
they are present in both organic and mineral form.

"Practically the entire stock or store of all of the elements in the
soil is insoluble and consequently unavailable for the use of
growing plants; and, as I said, some of the chief plans and efforts
of the farmer should be directed to the business of making plant
food available.

"The nitrogen contained in the insoluble organic matter of the soil
is made soluble and available by the process called nitrification.
Three different kinds of bacteria are required to bring about the
complete change."

"Are these bacteria different from the nitrogen fixing bacteria?"
asked Mr. Thornton.

"Entirely different," Percy replied, "and there are three distinct
kinds, one for each of the three steps in the process.

"The first may be called ammonia bacteria. They have power to
convert organic nitrogen into ammonia nitrogen; that is, into the
compound of nitrogen and hydrogen; and this step in the process is
called ammonification.

"The other two kinds are the true nitrifying bacteria. One of them
converts the ammonia into nitrites, and the other changes the
nitrites into nitrates. These two kinds are known as the nitrite
bacteria and the nitrate bacteria.

"Technically the last two steps in the process are nitrification
proper; but, speaking generally, the term nitrification is used to
include the three steps, or both ammonification and nitrification
proper.

"Now, the nitrifying bacteria require certain conditions, otherwise
they will not perform their functions. Among these essential
conditions are the presence of moisture and free oxygen, a supply of
carbonates, certain food materials for the bacteria themselves, and
a temperature within certain limits.

"You may remember, Mr. Thornton, that more soil nitrogen is made
available for cowpeas during the summer weather than for clover
during the cooler fall and spring?"

"Yes, I remember that distinction."

"I declare," said Miss Russell, "Tom talks as though he had been
there and seen the things going on. I haven't seen you using any
microscope."

"Well, I tell you, I've mighty near seen 'em," was the reply. "Mr.
Johnston makes everything so plain that I can mighty near see what
he saw when he looked through the microscope."

"I greatly enjoyed my microscopic work," said Percy, "and still more
the work in the chemical laboratory where we finally learned to
analyze soils, to take them apart and see what they contain,--how
much nitrogen how much phosphorus, how much limestone, or how much
soil acidity, which means that limestone is needed. Then I also
enjoyed the work in the pot-culture laboratory, where we learned not
to analyze but to synthesize; that is, to put different materials
together to make a soil. Thus, we would make one soil and put in all
of the essential plant food elements except nitrogen, and another
with only phosphorus lacking, and still another with both nitrogen
and phosphorus present, and all of the other essential elements
provided, except potassium, or magnesium, or iron. These prepared
soils were put in glass jars having a hole in the bottom for
drainage, and then the same kind of seeds were planted in each jar
or pot. Some students planted corn, others oats or wheat or any kind
of farm seeds. I grew rape plants in one series of pots, and I have
a photograph with me which shows very well that all of the plant
food elements are essential.

"You see one pot contained no plant food and one was prepared with
all of the ten essential elements provided. Then the other pots
contained all but one of the necessary soil elements, as indicated
in the photograph."

"Why, I never saw anything like that," said Mrs. Thornton.

"But I have many a time," said her husband, "right here on this old
farm; I don't know what's lacking, of course, but some years I've
thought most everything was lacking. But, according to this
pot-culture test, you can't raise any crops if just one of these ten
elements is lacking, no matter how much you have of the other nine;
and it seems to make no difference which one is lacking, you don't
get any crop. Is that the fact, Mr. Johnston?"

One pot with no plant food, and one with all the essential elements
provided, and still others with but one element lacking. All planted
the same day and cared for alike.

"Yes, Sir," Percy replied. "Where all of the elements are provided,
a fine crop is produced, but in each case where a single element is
omitted that is the only difference, and in some cases the result is
worse than where no plant food is supplied. It seems to hurt the
plant worse to throw its food supply completely out of balance than
to leave it with nothing except what it draws from the meager store
in the seed planted. Of course all the pots were planted with the
same kind of seed at the same time, and they were all watered
uniformly every day."

"Those results are very striking, indeed," said Miss Russell," but I
suppose one would never see such marked differences under farm
conditions?"

"Only under unusual or abnormal conditions," Percy replied, "but the
fact is that as a very general rule our crop yields are limited
chiefly because the supply of available plant food is limited.
Sometimes the clover crop is a complete failure on untreated land,
while it lives and produces a good crop if the soil is properly
treated; and in such cases the difference developed in the field is
just as marked as in the pot-cultures. In general we may set it down
as an absolute fact that the productive power of normal land depends
primarily upon the ability of the soil to feed the crop.

"I have here a photograph of a corn field on very abnormal soil.
They had the negative at the Experiment Station and I secured a
print from it, in part because I became interested in a story
connected with this experiment field, which our professor of soil
fertility reported to us.

"This shows a field of corn growing on peaty swamp land, of which
there are several hundred thousand acres in the swamp regions of
Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin. This peaty soil is extremely rich
in humus and nitrogen, well supplied with phosphorus and other
elements, except potassium; but in this element it is extremely
deficient. This land was drained out at large expense, and produced
two or three large crops because the fresh grass roots contained
some readily available potassium; but after three or four years the
corn crop became a complete failure, as you see from the untreated
check plot on the right; while the land on the left, where potassium
was applied, produced forty-five bushels per acre the year this
photograph was taken, and with heavier treatment from sixty to
seventy-five bushels are produced."

"Seventy-five bushels would be fifteen barrels of corn per acre.
How's that, Little Wife?" asked Tom.

"It's even more wonderful than the pot culture," replied Mrs.
Thornton; "but how much did the potassium cost, Mr. Johnston."

"About three dollars an acre," replied Percy; "but of course the
land has almost no value if not treated; and as a matter of fact the
three dollars is less than half the interest on the difference in
value between this land and our ordinary corn belt land. These peaty
swamp lands are to a large extent in scattered areas, and commonly,
if a farmer owns some of this kind of land, he also owns some other
good land, perhaps adjoining the swamp; but this is not always the
case, and was not with the man in the story I mentioned. This man
lived a few miles away and his farm was practically all of this
peaty swamp land type. He heard of this experiment field and came
with his family to see it.

"As he stood looking, first at the corn on the treated and untreated
land, and then at his wife and large family of children, he broke
down and cried like a child. Later he explained to the
superintendent who was showing him the experiments, that he had put
the best of his life into that kind of land. 'The land looked rich,'
said he,--'as rich as any land I ever saw. I bought it and drained
it and built my home on a sandy knoll. The first crops were fairly
good, and we hoped for better crops; but instead they grew worse and
worse. We raised what we could on a small patch of sandy land, and
kept trying to find out what we could grow on this black bogus land.
Sometimes I helped the neighbors and got a little money, but my wife
and I and my older children have wasted twenty years on this land.
Poverty, poverty, always! How was I to know that this single
substance which you call potassium was all we needed to make this
land productive and valuable? Oh, if I had only known this twenty
years ago, before my wife had worked like a slave,--before my
children had grown almost to manhood and womanhood, in poverty and
ignorance!'"

"Why wasn't the matter investigated sooner?" asked Miss Russell.
"Why didn't the government find out what the land needed long
before?"

"I am a Yankee," said Percy. "Why have American statesmen ridden
back and forth to the national capitol through a wilderness of
depleted and abandoned farms in the eastern states for half a
century or more before the first appropriation was made for the
purpose of agricultural investigation? and why, even now, does not
this rich federal government appropriate to the agricultural
experiment station in every state a fund at least equal to the
aggregate salaries of the congressmen from the same state, this fund
to be used exclusively for the purpose of discovering and
demonstrating profitable systems of permanent agriculture on every
type of soil? Why do we as a nation expend five hundred million
dollars annually for the development of the army and navy, and only
fifteen millions for agriculture, the one industry whose ultimate
prosperity must measure the destiny of the nation?

"Moralists sometimes tell us that the fall of the Babylonian Empire,
the fall of the Egyptian Empire, of the Grecian Empire, and the
Roman Empire, were all due to the development of pride and
immorality among those peoples; whereas, we believe that
civilization tends rather toward peace, security, and higher
citizenship. Is not the chief explanation for the ultimate and
successive fall of those great empires to be found in the exhausted
or wasted agricultural resources of the country?

"The land that once flowed with milk and honey might then support a
mighty empire, with independent resources sufficient for times of
great emergencies, but now that land seems almost barren and
supports a few wandering bands of marauding Arabs and villages of
beggars.

"The power and world influence of a nation must pass away with the
passing of material resources; for poverty is helpless, and
ignorance is the inevitable result of continued poverty. Only the
prosperous can afford education or trained intelligence.

"Old land is poorer than new land. There are exceptions, but this is
the rule. The fact is known and recognized by all America.

"What does it mean? It means that the practice of the past and
present art of agriculture leads toward land ruin,--not only in
China, where famine and starvation are common, notwithstanding that
thousands and thousands of Chinese are employed constantly in saving
every particle of fertilizing material, even gathering the human
excrements from every house and by-place in village and country, as
carefully as our farmers gather honey from their hives; not only in
India where starvation's ghost is always present, where, as a rule,
there are more hungry people than the total population of the United
States; not only in Russia where famine is frequent; but, likewise
in the United States of America, the present practice of the art of
agriculture tends toward land ruin.

"Nations rise and fall; so does the productive power of vast areas
of land. Better drainage, better seed, better implements, and more
thorough tillage, all tend toward larger crops, but they also tend
toward ultimate land ruin, for the removal of larger crops only
hastens soil depletion.

"To bring about the adoption of systems of farming that will restore
our depleted Eastern and Southern soils, and that will maintain or
increase the productive power of our remaining fertile lands of the
Great Central West, where we are now producing half of the total
corn crop of the entire world, is not only the most important
material problem of the United States; but to bring this about is
worthy of, and will require, the best thought of the most
influential men of America. Without a prosperous agriculture here
there can be no permanent prosperity for our American institutions.
While some small countries can support themselves by conducting
trade, commerce, and manufacture, for other countries, American
agriculture must not only be self-supporting, but, in large degree,
agriculture must support our other great industries.

"Without agriculture, the coal and iron would remain in the earth,
the forest would be left uncut, the railroads would be abandoned,
the cities depopulated, and the wooded lands and water-ways would
again be used only for hunting and fishing. Shall we not remember,
for example, that the coal mine yields a single harvest--one
crop--and is then forever abandoned; while the soil must yield a
hundred--yes, a thousand crops, and even then it must be richer and
more productive than at the beginning, if those who come after us
are to continue to multiply and replenish the earth.

"Even the best possible system of soil improvement, we must admit,
is not the absolute and final solution of this, the most stupendous
problem of the United States. If war gives way to peace and
pestilence to science, then the time will come when the soils of
America shall reach the limit of the highest productive power
possible to be permanently maintained, even by the general adoption
of the most practical scientific methods; and before that limit is
reached, if power, progress, and plenty are to continue in our
beloved country, there must be developed and enforced the law of the
survival of the fittest; otherwise there is no ultimate future for
America different from that of China, India, and Russia, the only
great agricultural countries comparable to the United States. An
enlightened humanity must grant to all the right to live, but the
reproduction and perpetuation of the unfit can never be an absolute
and inalienable right.

"Under the present laws and customs, a man may spend half his life
in the insane asylum or in the penitentiary, and still be the father
of a dozen children with degenerate tendencies. There should be no
reproduction from convicted criminals, insane persons, and other
degenerates. Thieves, grafters, bribers and bribe-takers all belong
in the same class, and it should not be left possible for them to
reproduce their kind. They are a burden upon the public which the
public must bear, but the public is under no obligation to permit
their multiplication. The children of such should never become the
parents of others. It is a crime against both the child and the
public.

"No doubt you will consider this extremely visionary, and so it is;
but unless America can see a vision somewhat like this, a population
that is doubling three or four times each century, and an area of
depleted soils that is also increasing at a rapid rate will combine
to bring our Ship of State into a current against which we may
battle in vain; for there is not another New World to bring new
wealth, new prosperity, and new life and light after another period
of 'Dark Ages.'

"Whether we shall ever apply any such intelligence to the possible
improvement of our own race as we have in the great improvement of
our cattle and corn is, of course, an open question; but to some
extent you will agree that the grafter and the insane, like the
poet, are born and not made. Of course there are, and always will
be, marked variations, mutants, or 'sports,' but, nevertheless,
natural inheritance is the master key to the improvement of every
form of life; and it is an encouraging fact that some of the states,
as Indiana, for example, have already adopted laws looking toward
the reduction of the reproduction of convicted degenerates."






CHAPTER XVI

PAST SELF REDEMPTION





"BUT I have rambled far from the subject assigned me," Percy
continued.

"That's only because I interrupt and ask so many side questions,"
replied Mr. Thornton, "but I hope yet to learn more about those
'suitable conditions' for nitrogen-fixation and nitrification. It
begins to look as though the nitrogen cycle deviates a good deal
from a true circle, and nature seems to need some help from us to
make that element circulate as fast as we need it. I confess, too,
that this method appeals to me much more than the
twenty-cent-a-pound proposition of the fertilizer agent."

"Yes, indeed," added Miss Russell; "and if we had to spend three
dollars an acre on this farm our 'Slough of Despond' would be worse
than the slough, or swamp, Mr. Johnston has told us about."

"I fear the practical and profitable improvement of an acre of this
land is more likely to cost thirty dollars than three," said Percy.

"Oh, for the land's sake!" came the ejaculation.

"Yes, 'for the land's sake,'" repeated Percy; "and for the sake of
those who must depend upon the land for their support for all time
hereafter."

"How ridiculous! Thirty dollars an acre for the improvement of land
that will not bring ten dollars to begin with!"

"It is better to look at the other end of the undertaking," said
Percy. "Suppose you invest thirty dollars an acre and in a few years
make your ten-dollar land produce as much as our two-hundred dollar
land!"

"But, Mr. Johnston; do you realize how much money it would require
to expend thirty dollars an acre on nine hundred acres?" continued
Miss Russell, with stronger accentuation.

"Twenty-seven thousand dollars," was the simple reply.

"Well, Sir," she said, "you are welcome to this whole farm for ten
thousand dollars."

"I am not wishing for it," he answered. "In fact I would not take
this farm as a gift, if I were obliged to keep it and pay the taxes
and had no other property or source of income."

"That's just the kind of talk I've been putting up to these girls,"
said Mr. Thornton. "By the time we live and pay about two hundred
dollars a year taxes on all this land, I tell you, there is nothing
left; and we'd been worse off than we are, except for the sale we
made to the railroad company."

"Well, the Russells lived here very well for more than a hundred
years," she retorted, "and my grandfather supported one nigger for
every ten acres of the farm, but I would like to know any farmers
about here who can put thirty dollars an acre, or even ten dollars
an acre, back into their soil for improvement."

"The problem is indeed a serious one," said Percy. "Unquestionably
much of the land in these older states is far past the point of
possible self-redemption under the present ownership. Land from
which the fertility has been removed by two hundred years of
cropping, until it has ceased to return a living to those who till
it, cannot have its fertility restored sufficiently to again make
its cultivation profitable, except by making some considerable
investment in order to replace those essential elements the supply
of which has become so limited as to limit the crop yields to a
point where their value is below the cost of production. Even on the
remaining productive lands in the North Central States, if we are
ever to adopt systems of permanent agriculture, it must be done
while the landowners are still prosperous. If the people of the corn
belt repeat the history of the Eastern States until their lands
cease to return a profit above the total cost of production, then
they, too, will have nothing left to invest in the improvement of
their lands."

"But their fertility could still be restored by outside capital?"
suggested Mr. Thornton. "I know very well that is the only solution
of our problem."

"Well, Tom, I would like to know where the outside capital is coming
from," said Miss Russell.

"Marry rich," he replied. "Don't make such a blunder as your sister
did."

"I fear that Mr. Johnston will suggest that we sell some more land,"
remarked Mrs. Thornton.

"All right," replied her sister; "and we will sell it to him. If he
won't take the whole farm as a gift, we'll cut it to any length he
wishes. Do you consider 'Ten Acres Enough,' Mr. Johnston; or would
you prefer 'Three Acres and Liberty?' We'll do our best to enable
you to enjoy 'The Fat of the Land.' Just tell us how large a farm
you want, I know already that you do not want nine hundred acres."

"My dear Miss Russell," said Percy. "This is so sudden"; whereupon
Mr. Thornton nearly fell from his chair and Mrs. Thornton laughed
heartily at the sister's expense who blushed as she might have done
twenty years before.

"However," Percy resumed, "if you should decide to dispose of about
half of that seven hundred acres which you use only as a safety bank
for most of your two hundred dollars in taxes, please consider me a
prospective taker."

"Take her," said Mr. Thornton, and again confusion reigned.

"Tom is so anxious to get rid of his sister-in-law that he reminds
me of the man whose mother-in-law died," said Miss Russell. "He was
too far from home to return to the usual funeral, and they
telegraphed him the sad news and asked if they should embalm,
cremate, or bury the remains. He wired back: 'Embalm, cremate, and
bury'"

"That matter of outside capital is by no means so substantial as it
might seem," said Percy. "It is worth while to consider how little
real wealth there would be in America if the remaining rich lands
should become impoverished. The railroads would at once cease to pay
dividends, and those who are now millionaires in railroad stock
would find themselves on the rapid road to poverty. The manufacturer
of finished products from the raw materials raised on the farm, the
manufacturer of agricultural implements, and the great urban
population whose income is from the trade in raw materials and
manufactured goods would soon see their wealth shrivel. The great
sky scrapers of the cities would be left for the owls and bats to
harbor in, if our agricultural lands ceased to yield their great
harvests. Meanwhile the farming people would continue to live upon
the meager products still produced from the impoverished soil, even
though they had no surplus food to ship into the cities. Human labor
would replace that of domestic animals on the farm, just as it has
done in China and India, in part because man's labor is worth more
than that of the beast, when measured only by the amount of food
consumed, and in part because a thousand bushels of grain will
support five times as many people can be supported for the same time
upon the animal products that could be produced by feeding the
grain."

"Oh, that is such a gloomy view to take of it," said Miss Russell.

"And all the world loves an optimist," replied Percy laughingly.
"Soils do not wear out; there is no poor land; the farms are better
and the crops larger than ever before; and we are the people of the
world's greatest nation, with an assured future glory which
surposses all conception."

"As soon as we get the canal dug," suggested Mr. Thornton.

"Yes, we will surely be able to dig that Panama ditch," said Percy;
"and probably our resources will last to cut a gash or two in our
own interior, if we don't build too many battle ships. You know
Egypt built three great pyramids before her resources became reduced
to such an extent that the people required all their energies to
secure a living."






CHAPTER XVII

MORE PROBLEMS





"NOW let us give Mr. Johnston a chance to tell us about the nitrogen
problem," said Mr. Thornton. "I'm pretty well satisfied with the
natural circulation of carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen; but I want to
understand all I can of the practical methods of securing and
utilizing nitrogen; and we have heard almost nothing about the other
six essential elements which the soil must furnish. Let me see.--I
think you said that iron, calcium, magnesium and potassium are
usually abundant in the soil, while phosphorus and sulfur are very
limited."

"Yes, that is the rule under general or average conditions, but it
should be stated that the amount of sulfur required by plants is
very small as compared with phosphorus, a difference which places a
great distinction between them. Besides considerable quantities of
sulfur are returned to the air in the combustion of coal and organic
matter, and this returns to the soil in rain. The information thus
far secured shows that sulfur rarely if ever limits the crop yields
under field conditions; and the same may be said of iron, which is
required by plants in very small amount and is contained in
practically all soils in enormous quantities.

"While normal soils contain abundance of potassium, with about half
as much calcium and one-fourth as much magnesium; yet, when measured
by crop requirements for plant food, the supplies of these three
elements are not markedly different. On the other hand, about 300
pounds of calcium are lost per acre per annum by leaching from good
soils in humid climates, compared with about 10 pounds of potasssium
and intermediate amounts of magnesium; so that, of these three
elements, calcium requires by far the most consideration and
potassium the least, even aside from the use of limestone to correct
or prevent soil acidity.

"Among the conditions essential for nitrification may be mentioned
the presence of free oxygen and limestone; and of course all
bacteria require certain food materials, resembling other plants in
this respect."

"Are they plants?" asked Mrs. Thornton. "I thought they were tiny
little animals."

"No, they are classified as plants," replied Percy; "but the
scientists have difficulty with some of the lower organism to decide
whether they are plants or animals. The college boys used to say
that some animals were plants in the botanical department and
animals again when they studied zoology. Orton says it is easy to
tell a cow from a cabbage, but impossible to assign any absolute,
distinctive character which will divide animal life from plant life.

"The oxygen is essential for nitrification, because that is an
oxidation process. That is, it is a kind of combustion, so to speak.
The organic matter is oxidized or converted into substances
containing more oxygen than in the original form. In ammonification
the carbon is separated or divorced from the nitrogen and united
with oxygen. Some of the hydrogen of the organic matter remains
temporarily with the carbon, and some is held temporarily with the
nitrogen in the form of ammonia.

"The nitrite bacteria replace two of the hydrogen atoms in ammonia
with one of oxygen, and insert another oxygen atom between the
nitrogen and the remaining hydrogen, thus forming nitrous acid;
H-O-N=O, or HNO2.

"The nitrate bacteria then cause the direct addition of another
oxygen atom, which is held by the two extra bonds of the nitrogen
atom, which you will remember is a five-handed atom.

"Thus you will see the absolute need of free oxygen in the
nitrification process; and we can control the rate of nitrification
to a considerable extent by our methods of tillage. In soils
deficient in organic matter, excessive cultivation may still
liberate sufficient nitrogen for a fairly satisfactory crop; and the
benefits of such excessive cultivation for potatoes and other
vegetables is more often due to increased nitrification than to the
conservation of moisture, to which it is frequently ascribed by
agricultural writers.

"Thus the more we cultivate, the more we hasten the nitrification,
oxidation, or destruction of the organic matter or humus of the
soil. Where the soil is well supplied with decaying organic matter,
we rarely need to cultivate in a humid section like this, except for
the purpose of killing weeds.

"The presence of carbonates in the soil is essential for
nitrification, because the bacteria will not continue the process in
the presence of their own product. Nitrification ceases if the
nitrous or nitric acid remains as such; but, in the presence of
carbonates such as calcium carbonate (ordinary limestone) or the
double carbonate of magnesium and calcium (magnesian limestone, or
dolomite), the nitrous acid or nitric acid is converted into a
neutral salt of calcium or magnesium, one of these atoms taking the
place of two hydrogen atoms and forming, say, calcium nitrate:
Ca(NO3)2. At the same time the hydrogen atoms take the place of the
calcium in limestone ( CaC03), and form carbonic acid (H2CO3), which
at once decomposes into water (H2O) and carbon dioxid (CO2), which
thus escapes as a gas into the air or remains in the pores of the
soil.

"The fact that nitrification will not proceed in the presence of
acid reminds us that only a certain degree of acidity can be
developed in sour milk. Here the lactic acid bacteria produce the
acid from milk sugar, but the process stops when about seven-tenths
of one per cent. of lactic acid has developed. If some basic
substance, such as lime, is then added, the acid is neutralized and
the fermentation again proceeds.

"In the general process of decay and oxidation of the organic matter
of the soil, the nitrogen thus passes through the forms of ammonia,
nitrous acid, and nitric acid, and at the same time the carbon
passes into various acid compounds, including the complex humic and
ulmic acids, and smaller amounts of acetic acid (found in vinegar),
lactic acid, oxalic acid (found in oxalic), and tartaric acid (found
in grapes). The final oxidation products of the carbon and hydrogen
are carbon dioxid and water, which result from the decomposition of
the carbonic acid.

"Now the various acids of carbon and nitrogen constitute one of the
most important factors in soil fertility. They are the means by
which the farmer can dissolve and make available for the growing
crops the otherwise insoluble mineral elements, such as iron,
calcium, magnesium, and potassium, all of which are contained in
most soils in great abundance. These elements exist in the soil
chiefly in the form of insoluble silicates. Silicon itself is a
four-handed element which bears somewhat the same relation to the
mineral matter of the soil as carbon bears to the organic matter.
Quartz sand is silicon dioxid (SiO2). Oxygen, which is present in
nearly all substances, including air, water, and most solids,
constitutes about one-half of all known matter. Silicon is next in
abundance, amounting to more than one-fourth of the solid crust of
the earth. Aluminum is third in abundance (about seven per cent),
aluminum silicate being common clay. Iron, calcium, potassium,
sodium, and magnesium, in this order, complete the eight abundant
elements, which aggregate about ninety-eight per cent. of the solid
crust of the earth.

"It is worth while to know that about two and one-half per cent. of
the earth's crust is potassium, while about one-tenth of one per
cent. is phosphorus; also that when a hundred bushels of corn are
sold from the farm, seventeen pounds of phosphorus, nineteen of
potassium, and seven of magnesium are carried away.

"The acids formed from the decaying organic matter not only liberate
for the use of crops the mineral elements contained in the soil in
abundance, but they also help to make available the phosphorus of
raw phosphate, when naturally contained in the soil, as it is to
some extent in all soils, or when applied to the soil in the
fine-ground natural phosphate from the mines.

"Now the increase or decrease of organic matter in the soil is
measured with a very good degree of satisfaction by the element
nitrogen, which is a regular constituent of the organic matter of
the soil; and you are already familiar, Mr. Thornton, with the
amounts of nitrogen contained in average farm manure and in some of
our most common crops."

"Yes, Sir, I have some of the figures in my note book and I mean to
have them in my head very soon. But, say, that organic matter seems
to be a thing of tremendous importance, and I'm sure we've got
mighty little of it. I think about the only thing we'll need to do
to make this old farm productive again is to grow the vegetation and
plow it under. As it decays, it will furnish the nitrogen, and
liberate the phosphorus, potassium, calcium, and magnesium; and we
may have plenty of all of them just waiting to be liberated."

"That is altogether possible," said Percy; "but it must be
remembered that your soil is acid and consequently will not grow
clover or alfalfa successfully, or even cowpeas very satisfactorily.
A liberal use of ground limestone and large use of clover may be
sufficient to greatly improve your soil; but if I am permitted to
separate Miss Russell and the Thorntons "--Mr. Thornton's hilarious
"Ha, ha" cut Percy short. He crimsoned and the ladies smiled at each
other with expressions that revealed nothing whatever.

"Now let me finish," Percy continued, when Mr. Thornton had somewhat
subsided. "I say, if I am permitted to separate Miss Russell and the
Thorntons from about three hundred acres of their land, I shall
certainly wish to know its total content of phosphorus, potassium,
magnesium, and calcium, before I make any purchase; and, if you will
remember the pot cultures and the peaty swamp land, I think you'd
agree with me.

"Well, I shall be mighty glad to know that myself," said Mr.
Thornton, "and we shall much appreciate it if you can tell us how
to secure that information."

"We can collect some soil to-morrow," Percy replied, "and send it to
a chemist for analysis."

"Good," said Mr. Thornton; "now just one more question, and I think
I shall sleep better if I have it answered to-night. Just what is
meant by potash and phosphoric acid?"

"Potash," said Percy, "is a compound of potassium and oxygen. The
proportions are one atom of oxygen and two atoms of potassium, which
you may remember are single-handed and weigh thirty-nine, so that
seventy-eight of potassium unite with sixteen of oxygen. A better
name for the compound is potassium oxid: K20. The Latin name for
potassium is kalium, and K is the symbol used for an atom of that
element. If you were to purchase potassium in the form of potassium
chlorid, which in the East is often called by the old incorrect name
'muriate of potash,' the salt might be guaranteed to contain a
certain percentage of potash, which, however, consists of
eighty-three per cent. of potassium and seventeen of oxygen."

"Just what is this potassium chlorid, or 'muriate of potash'?"

"Pure potassium chlorid contains only the two elements, potassium
and chlorin."

"But didn't you say that it was guaranteed to contain potash and
that potash is part oxygen? Now you say it contains only potassium
and chlorin."

"Yes, I am sorry to say, that this is one of those blunders of our
semi-scientific ancestors for which we still suffer. The chemist
understands that the meaning of the guarantee of potash is the
amount of potash that the potassium present in the potassium chlorid
could be converted into. The best you can do is to reduce the potash
guarantee to potassium by taking eighty-three per cent. of it; or,
to be more exact, divide by ninety-four and multiply by
seventy-eight, in order to eliminate the sixteen parts of oxygen.

"It may be well to keep in mind that when the druggist says potash
he means potassium hydroxid, KOH, a compound of potassium, hydrogen,
and oxygen, as the name indicates."

"You mentioned the word chlorin," said Mr. Thornton. "That is
another element?"

"Yes, that is a very common element. Ordinary table salt is sodium
chlorid: NaCl. Sodium is called natrium in Latin, and Na is the
symbol used in English to be in harmony with all other languages,
for practically all use the same chemical symbols. Sodium and
potassium are very similar elements in some respects, and in the
free state they are very peculiar, apparently taking fire when
thrown into water. Chlorin in the free state is a poisonous gas.
Thus the change in properties is well illustrated when these two
dangerous elements, sodium and chlorin, unite to form the harmless
compound which we call common salt.

"It is a shame," continued Percy, "that agricultural science has so
long been burdened with such a term as 'phosphoric acid,' which
serves to complicate and confuse what should be made the simplest
subject to every American farmer and landowner. As agriculture is
the fundamental support of America and of all her other great
industries, so the fertility of the soil is the absolute support of
every form of agriculture. Now, if there is any one factor that can
be the most important, where so many are positively essential, then
the most important factor in the problem of adopting and maintaining
permanent systems of profitable agriculture on American soils is the
element phosphorus.

"Phosphorus in very appreciable amount is positively necessary for
the growth of every organism. It is an absolutely essential
constituent of the nucleus of every living cell, whether plant or
animal. Nuclein, itself, which is the substance nearest to the
beginning of a new cell, contains as high as ten per cent. of the
element phosphorus.

"On the other hand, phosphorus is the most limited of all the plant
food elements, measured by supply and demand and circulation.

"What is phosphoric acid? Well, the professor of chemistry says it
is a compound containing three atoms of hydrogen, one of phosphorus,
and four of oxygen. It is a syrupy liquid and one of the strongest
mineral acids. In concentrated form it is as caustic as oil of
vitriol. Why, here you have a Century dictionary. That should tell
what phosphoric acid is. This is what the Century says:

"'It is a colorless, odorless syrup, with an intensely sour taste.
It is tribasic, forming three distinct classes of metallic salts.
The three atoms of hydrogen may in like manner be replaced by
alcohol radicles, forming acid and neutral ethers. Phosphoric acid
is used in medicine as a tonic.'

"That," continued Percy, "is the complete definition as given by the
Century dictionary as to what phosphoric acid is, and I note that
this is the latest edition of the Century, copyrighted in 1902."

"We bought it less than a month ago," said Mrs. Thornton. "We can
have so few books that we thought the Century would be a pretty good
library in itself; Mr. Thornton has had too little time to use it
much as yet."

"Well, even if I had used it," said Mr. Thornton, "you see there are
five volumes before I'd get to the P's. But, joking aside, I don't
get much out of that definition except that phosphoric acid is a
sour liquid and is used in medicine."

"The definition is entirely correct," said Percy "Any text on
chemistry will give you a very similar definition, and your
physician and druggist will give you the same information."

"Well, I know the fertilizer agents claim to sell phosphoric acid in
two-hundred-pound bags which wouldn't hold any kind of liquid."

"True," replied Percy, "and I consider it a shame that the farm boy
who goes to the high school or college and is there taught exactly
what phosphoric acid is, must. when he returns to the farm, try to
read bulletins from his agricultural experiment station in which the
term 'phosphoric acid' is used for what it is not. At the state
agricultural college, the professor of chemistry correctly teaches
the farm boy that phosphoric acid is a liquid compound containing
three atoms of hydrogen, one of phosphorus, and four of oxygen in
the molecule; and then the same professor, as an experiment station
investigator, goes to the farmers' institutes and incorrectly
teaches the same boy's father that phosphoric acid is a solid
compound pound containing two atoms of phosphorus and five atoms of
oxygen in the molecule."

"But why do they continue to teach such confusion?"

"Well, Sir, if they know, they never tell. In some manner this
misuse of the name was begun, and every year doubles the difficulty
of stopping it."

"Like the man that was too lazy to stop work when he had once
begun," remarked Mr. Thornton.

"Yes," said Percy, "but it is true that some of the States have
adopted the practice of reporting analyses of soils and fertilizers
on the basis of nitrogen instead of ammonia; and in the Corn Belt
States, phosphorus and potassium are the terms used to a large
extent instead of 'phosphoric acid,' and potash. The agricultural
press is greatly assisting in bringing about the adoption of the
simpler system, and the laws of some States now require that the
percentages of the actual plant food elements, as nitrogen,
phosphorus, and potassium, shall be guaranteed in fertilizers
offered for sale. It is one of those questions that are never
settled until they are settled right; and it is only a question of
time until the simple element basis will be used throughout the
United States, or at least in the Central and Western States."

"The so-called 'phosphoric acid' of the fertilizer agent is a
compound whose molecule contains two atoms of phosphorus and five
atoms of oxygen; and, since the atomic weight of phosphorus is
thirty-one and that of oxygen sixteen, this compound contains
sixty-two parts of phosphorus and eighty parts of oxygen. In other
words, this phosphoric acid, falsely so-called, contains a trifle
less than forty-four per cent. of the actual element phosphorus."

"Is the bone phosphate of lime that the agents talk about the same
as the 'phosphoric acid'?" asked Mr. Thornton.

"No, by 'bone phosphate of lime,' which is often abbreviated B. P.
L., is meant tricalcium phosphate, a compound which contains exactly
twenty per cent. of phosphorus. Thus, you can always divide the
guaranteed percentage of 'bone phosphate of lime' by five, and the
result will be the per cent. of phosphorus.

"As stated in your Century dictionary, true phosphoric acid forms
three distinct classes of salts, because either one, two, or all of
the three hydrogen atoms may be replaced by a metallic element.
Thus, we have phosphoric acid itself containing the three hydrogen
atoms, one phosphorus atom, and four oxygen atoms. This might be
called trihydrogen phosphate (H3PO4). Now if one of the hydrogen
atoms is replaced by one potassium atom, we have potassium
dihydrogen phosphate (KH2PO4); with two potassium atoms and one
hydrogen, we have dipotassium hydrogen phosphate (K2HPO4); and if
all hydrogen is replaced by potassium the compound is tripotassium
phosphate (K3PO4). To make similar salts with two-handed metallic
elements, like calcium or magnesium, we need to start with two
molecules of phosphoric acid H6(PO4)2; because each atom of calcium
will replace two hydrogen atoms. Thus we have mono calcium
phosphate, CaH4(PO4)2, dicalcium phosphate, Ca2H2(PO4)2, and
tricalcium phosphate, Ca3(PO4)2. It goes without saying that
monocalcium phosphate contains four atoms of hydrogen and that
dicalcium phosphate contains two hydrogen atoms. By knowing the
atomic weights (40 for calcium, 31 for phosphorus, and 16 for
oxygen), it is easy to compute that the molecule of tricalcium
phosphate weighs 310 of which 62 is phosphorus. This is exactly
one-fifth, or twenty per cent. This compound you will remember is
sometimes called 'bone phosphate of lime'. It is also called simply
'bone phosphate'; because it is the phosphorus compound contained in
bones. It is sometimes called lime phosphate, although it contains
no lime in the true sense, for it has no power to neutralize acid
soils, except when the phosphorus is taken up by plants more rapidly
than the calcium, which in such case might remain in the soil to act
as a base to neutralize soil acids; but even then the effect of the
small amount of calcium thus liberated from the phosphate would be
very insignificant compared with a liberal application of ground
limestone."

"Well," said Mr. Thornton, stretching himself, "orange phosphate is
my favorite drink but I fear some of these phosphate you have just
been giving me are too concentrated. I ought to have the dose
diluted; but I like the taste of it, and if you'll write a book
along this line, in this plain way just about as you have been
giving it to me straight for almost twelve hours, I tell you I'll
read it over till I learn to understand it a heap better than I do
now."






CHAPTER XVIII

CLOSER TO MOTHER EARTH





THE following day Percy collected soil samples to represent the
common type of soil on the farm. In the main the land was nearly
level and very uniform, although here and there were small areas
which varied from the main type, and in places the variation was
marked. Percy and his host devoted the entire day to an examination
of the soils of the farm and the collection of the samples.

"The prevailing soil type is what would be called a loam," said
Percy, "and a single set of composite samples will fairly represent
at least three-fourths of the land on this farm.

"It seems to me that it is enough for the present to sample this
prevailing type, and later, if you desire, you could collect samples
of the minor types, of which there are at least three that are quite
distinct."

"A loam soil is one that includes a fair proportion of the several
groups of soil materials, including silt, clay, and sand."

"What is silt?" asked Mr. Thornton.

"Silt consists of the soil particles which are finer than sand,--too
small in fact to be felt as soil grains by rubbing between the
fingers, and yet it is distinctly granular, while clay is a mere
plastic or sticky mass like dough. What are commonly called clay
soils consist largely of silt, but contain enough true clay to bind
the silt into a stiff mass. In the main such soils are silt loams,
but when deficient in organic matter they are yellow in color as a
rule, and all such material is usually called clay by the farmers."

"Well, I had no idea that it would take us a whole day to get enough
dirt for an analysis," remarked Mr. Thornton, as they were
collecting the samples late in the afternoon. "Five minutes would
have been plenty of time for me, before I saw the holes you've bored
to-day."

"The fact is," replied Percy, "that the most difficult work of the
soil investigator is to collect the samples. Of course any one could
fill these little bags with soil in five minutes, but the question
is, what would the soil represent? It may represent little more than
the hole it came out of, as would be the case where the soil had
been disturbed by burrowing animals, or modified by surface
accumulations, as where a stack may sometime have been burned. In
the one case the subsoil may have been brought up and mixed with the
surface, and in the other the mineral constituents taken from forty
acres in a crop of clover may have been returned to one-tenth of an
acre."

"Certainly such things have occurred on many farms," agreed Mr.
Thornton, "and they may have occurred on this farm for all any one
knows."

"Fifty tons of clover hay," continued Percy, after making a few
computations, "would contain 400 pounds of phosphorus, 2400 pounds
of potassium, 620 pounds of magnesium, and 2340 pounds of calcium."

"I don't see how you keep all those figures in your head," said Mr.
Johnston.

"How many pounds are there in a ton of hay?" asked Percy.

"Two thousand."

"How many pounds in a bushel of oats?"

"Thirty in Virginia, but thirty-two in Carolina."

"How many in a bushel of wheat?"

"Sixty"

"Corn?"

"Fifty-six pounds of shelled corn, or seventy pounds of ears."

"Potatoes?"

"Eighty-six pounds,--both kinds the same, but most States require
sixty pounds for the Irish potatoes."

Percy laughed. "You see," he said, "you have more figures in your
head than I have in mine. You have mentioned twice as many right
here, without a moment's hesitation, as I try to remember for the
plant food contained in clover. I like to keep in mind the
requirements of large crops, such as it is possible to raise under
our climatic conditions if we will provide the stuff the crops are
made of, so far as we need to, and do the farm work as it should be
done. I never try to remember how much plant food is required for
twenty-two bushels of corn per acre, which is the average yield of
Virginia for the last ten years, while an authentic record reports a
yield of 239 bushels from an acre of land in South Carolina. On our
little farm in Illinois we have one field of sixteen acres, which
was used for a pasture and feed lot for many years by my grandfather
and has been thoroughly tile-drained since I was born, that has
produced as high as 2,015 bushels of corn in one season, thus making
an average of 126 bushels per acre.

"What I try to remember is the plant food requirements for such
crops as we ought to try to raise, if we do what ought to be done. I
try to remember the plant food required for a hundred-bushel crop of
corn, a hundred-bushel crop of oats, a fifty-bushel crop of wheat,
and four tons of clover hay. It is an easy matter to divide these
amounts by two, as I have really been doing here in the East where
it is hard for people to think in terms of such crops as these lands
ought to be made to produce.

"The requirements of the clover crop I certainly want to have in
mind as a part of my little stock of ever-ready knowledge. It is not
very hard to remember that a four-ton crop of clover hay, which we
ought to harvest from one acre in two cuttings, contains:

160 pounds of nitrogen,
31 pounds of magnesium,
20 pounds of phosphorus,
120 pounds of potassium,
117 pounds of calcium.

"It is just as easy to think in these terms as in per cent. or
pounds of butter fat, which I understand is the basis on which you
sell your cream."

"Yes, I believe

Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/4527