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Table showing the mean Winter and Summer temperatures of the chief cornproducing countries in the world.

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I. England:

1. Central England as observed at Malvern,
Bedford, Southwick, Lyndon and Norwich Malvern, &c. ..
2. Western England as observed at Penzance,
Helston, Truro, Plymouth, Torquay, Exe-

ter and Sidmouth.

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Penzance, &c. .

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II. Countries of which the Winter temperature is below, and the Summer temperature above

that of England:

EUROPEAN.

1. Northern Russsia..

2. Poland and Baltic Prussia..

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Table showing the mean relative values of the different kinds of Wheat quoted in the London Price Currents in the 5 years ending 1860.

Average Importaprices, years tions in the 1856 to 1860 single year

inclusive.

1860.

BALTIC PORTS.

Dantzic wheat: mixed, high-mixed, and extra qualities overhead...

Konigsberg: mixed and high-mixed..

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Average.

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English wheat: Essex and Kent, red and white; Norfolk, Lincoln and
Yorkshire, red

2 12 0

Average superiority of Baltic wheat over English wheat in the London market

06 6

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Average superiority of English wheat over wheat from extra Baltic

280

2 12 0

1,773,717

040

ports.....

American wheat:

United States...

Canada....

Average.....

English wheat as before

Average superiority of American over English wheat

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Average price of foreign wheat of all countries combined....
English wheat as before

2 13 10

2 12 0

Average superiority of foreign wheat generally over English wheat..

0 11 0

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THE SOIL WE CULTIVATE.

When we direct our attention to a more local branch of this important inquiry, so as to ascertain the matters removed from our cultivated fields by our ordinary crops, and returned to them by the farm-yard manure, then the chemist's aid becomes still more practically useful. Professor Anderson (Transactions Highland Society, 1861, p. 569) has lately endeavored to furnish the agriculturist with an approximate estimate of the various matters abstracted from the soil by the crops of a six-course rotation, and of the amount restored to the land by the ordinary farm-yard manure. The summary he gives of the total substances abstracted, is as follows: The rotation, which is a severe one, being turnips, wheat, hay, oats, and potatoes, (the turnip crop weighing per acre 13 tons; wheat crop, being seed, 28 bushels; the straw, 28 cwt., the hay, 2 tons, the oats, seed, 34 bushels, the straw, one ton, and potatoes three tons).

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The quantity of matters removed, observes Professor Anderson, would have been considerably reduced if a second year of grass pasture had been substituted for one of the white crops. It may be noticed also, that as compared with the total quantities of the substances contained in ordinary

soils, the matters removed are very small; and even if the phosphoric acid of the soil does not exceed a quarter per cent., it could maintain such crops for 276 years; and the same remark applies to the other elements, so that the prospect of exhaustion is, at all events, not immediate. If, continues the Professor, we next endeavor to ascertain the quantities of the elements of plants restored to the soil by farm-yard manures, we are met by the difficulty of estimating its ordinary application, and also by our still imperfect knowledge of its average composition. The number of good analyses of farm-yard manure is still small, and owing to the great difficulty of obtaining a fair sample, considerable discrepancies are found in those which have been published. By selecting, however, those results which are most trustworthy, the following table has been calculated so as to show the quantities of mineral matters and nitrogen in different quantities of the manure. Twelve tons have here been selected as an average application; the others, 16 and 20 tons, as quantities not unfrequently ap plied. The following results are expressed in pounds avoirdupois:

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It thus appears that an application of 20 tons per acre is able to supply the elements of an ordinary rotation, some of them in just sufficient quantity, others in considerable excess. Such are the demands made upon the soil by the crops we cultivate; such are the supplies offered in return by our farm-yards. But after all these valuable organic matters are returned to the soil, another great supply of the elements of vegetable substances are of necessity derived from the air we breathe, and it was to render these gases available to the farmer to the greater extent that the Norfolk, or four-course husbandry was introduced.

DEEP STIRRING OF THE SOIL.

Deep stirring proves beneficial to certain soils, but not to all. Indeed, it is questionable if uniform deep stirring can be profitably practiced on the greater portion of the cultivated soils in the United Kingdom. To a

clearer understanding of the term "stirring," it may be necessary to state that it is used for the inversion or turning over of the soil by the plow, and is not intended to include the stirring of the soil or subsoil by any form of subsoil plow. It has been frequenlty asserted of late that all soils may be stirred to a greater depth than formerly, with an increase of their productive capabilities. Such statements should, however, be received with considerable distrust. Doubtless there are conditions which, if present, are favorable to deep stirring, but these conditions are rather exceptional than general. For instance, soils resting upon subsoils containing the constituents of plant life in higher proportions than they are present in the cultivated soil, can be profitably stirred to a greater depth, bringing a portion of the subsoil to the surface, to be incorporated with the soil. Also, where certain conditions are to be secured, deeper stirring may be advantageously followed out. For example, by increasing the amount of manurial applications, conjoined with the deeper stirring, heavier crops can be grown; the increased outlay being met by the increased produce. As a rule, it is by securing both conditions-deep stirring with frequent and liberal manuring-that the greater portions of the soils can with advantage be stirred to a greater depth than has hitherto been practiced. Whatever is the depth of soil stirred, that soil should be rendered highly fertile, and maintained in that condition by the application of manures.

Continued cropping, with the removal of a portion of the crops, will in time render most soils comparatively unproductive, however deep they are stirred. There are soils which cannot be stirred to a greater depth than formerly, without impairing their productiveness, even with an increase of manurial application. Soils of a friable, or of a retentive texture, resting upon open, porous subsoils, such as chalk, gravel, sand, &c., and soils, the texture of which has been improved by the application of clay, marl, shell-sand, &c., cannot be stirred to a greater depth without interfering in part with the improvement effected. Deeper stirring necessarily decreases the percentage in the soil of the material which had been applied to alter its texture. An additional application of the material will doubtless correct this, but the increased outlay may not always be covered by the increased produce. There are other descriptions of soils which it is not advisable to stir to a greater depth than formerly-light, sandy, and peaty soils, resting upon subsoils of the same character as the surface soil. Compression rather than deep stirring is the best method to follow in cultivating these soils. We include in this category not only those sands or vegetable soils which drift during gales, but soils of a texture which do not move with winds. It is generally maintained that by deep stirring a greater surface is exposed to the action of the atmosphere, and consequently that the constituents of plants are present in the soil, in a state

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