Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1872-10-17

one or two hundred years, more or less,
draw ont Of the soil and snb-soil, salts of
potash, lime and magnesia, combined with
Phosphoric, sulphuric ane other acids.
which are not less important in the growth
q grain, grass. cotton and tobacco than
IN the growth Of oak, hickory and walnut.
These alkaline salts are the most precious
elements of fertility In all fruitful soils.
The reason why the land in Los Angeles,
and over vast tracts west Of Missouri, so
sbounds in alkaline salts is the small
quantity ofrain that falls annually to dis
solve these salts and carry them in rivers
down to the ocean. The annual disinte-
grafton OF locks and thar minute frag-
nentss which yield alkaline salts, is in ex-
cess of the annual precipitation of rain to
wash them into the sea. Hence the ground
is covered with soluble salts, called aalkali,"
over thousands Of square miles.
II spring Of water holding strong pot
ash salts in solution could be found on the
Plain, or in the Rocky Mountains, the evap-
Grafton of this water would yield COM
mercial manure of great value. Now, we
are importing thousands of tons of salt
of potash from mines in Germany, for agri-
cultural purposes. All the analyses that
have been made of the alkali gathered up
from the ground in the West have shown
common salt, or gloubler salts, (salts of
Soda) to be the principal ingredients. Very
little potash or phosphoric acid has been
found. There is enough to make the soil
fertile, but it is not in such quantities to
be carted off for manure. Very little at
tention has been given to the discovery of
minerals valuable as fertilizers. That they
wiz be found, or manufactured as common
salt is made from saline springs, 1t is rea-
sonable to believe.
In all the Southern States there is a def
cheney Of those substances which form
ashes when oak, hickory and walnut are
burnt; and it is a question of great i'm
pertance to learn from what source the de-
feet in our soils can be removed to the best
advantage. AS salts of potash, soda, lime
and magnesia are washed out of cultivated
fields into brooks, creeks, rivers and the
ocean, it is plain that if we evsporate sea-
water we shall obtain such salts as rains
wash out of continents and islands into the
sea. If we compare soft rain water evapo-
rated from the sea with the hard water that
flows from thousands and millions of
springs, and thence into the ocean, we may
easily understand the reason why the wstec
in the ocean is salt. Far more Of earthly
salts run forever from land into the ocean
than leave 1t by solar evaporation. To the
ocean we must look for fertilizers.
It Is aninstructive fact that the land in
Southern California, which produces two or
three times more corn per acre than our
land yields, has about ten times more of
those substances that form ashes when we
burn hickory and walnut timber. These
hickory and walnut alkslies and phos-
pilates are less abundant in our fields, and
in much of our fresh lands than is de-
sirable. Hence the growing demand for
potash salts from Germany, soda salts from
Peru, lime salts from Nova Scotia, and
phosphAtes from South Carolina.