The weekly Union times. [volume] (Union C.H., South Carolina) 1871-1894, 1880-02-27

H0wTo BE INDEPENDENT OF LABOR
How TO MAKE OUR LANDED ESTATE
PROFITABLE!
These are problems of the greatest con
cern to US, and they have, in great measure
been solved. Hereafter, the present system
or rimpovershmeDt OF lands, of wear ant
tear of mind and body, of exhaustion o
3 resources and credit, and of ultimate bank
ruptcy and penury, is to be supplanted BY
new system, by which our worn out ant
abandoned lands are to be restored to fertil
ity, our detected energies to be stimulated
into active and hopeful effort, happines:
! and fortune to be restored to ourselves and
children, aud prosperity and gladness again
to smile upon our PROSTATE and languishing
country. A great work, to be sure, as every
s body will say; but one wrought out by q
life of arduous labor, aided, by rare com.
bination Of talent and opportunity. And
this new system has been inaugurated by
our chemist, DR.. St. Julien Ravenal
through the iustrumentality of his com.
pound, called Ash Element.
Just as the greatest and most useful in
VeEtions in mechanics are always the most
simple, so that even child can understand
and use them, so it is in every other affair
of life the most useful and effective things
are always simple and easily understood, so
that from their very simplicity, indeed,
they often escape our observation.
The operations of nature, so far as they
concern us practically, are plainly to be un.
derstood but If VIC attempt to penetrate
beyond this, we fud ourselves involved in
inextricable difficulties But although the
mind is thus eminently finite, yet it is promo
to overlook things that are near and super
hcial, and reaches after the remote and the
profound.
We find this tendency in agriculture as
well as in other departments of industry.
We are digging and delving to great depths,
often when the object of our search is just
on the surface.
Hence we have elaborate treatises on ag-
ricultue, based on fanciful theories and
hypothesis, ignoring plain facts, having
seemingly for their purpose the aggrandizc.
ment of the author rather than the advance
ment of agriculture.
The laws of nature are infexible, and she
will serve US only as we observe her laws
Obviously, then, our study must be to find
out her ways. And in the pursuit of this
study VIC must be governed by observation
aud experiment.
Nature must answer our questions, and
net man.
For instance, if we want to grow wheat
we must learn by observation what are the
wants of wheat, and so with cotton and
corn.
IF we find that wheat wants heterogeneous
and peas inorganic material we must sup
ply accordingly.
If We find that after wheat Nitrogen is
diminished in the soil, and that after peas
the soil is rcplenished with Nitrogen, we
have gained important information.
Aud SO we will go on and observe next
the chemical processes which take place in
the soil, by which the reaction ofone ingre-
dient upon another produces a third diverse
from either. Nor will we fail to observe
the vital properties Of plants by which they
effect such changes in the constituents of
the soil as enables them to appropriate in
gradients that would be otherwise unavaila-
BILE.
In this connection DR.. Liebig says II,
have long since given up the prevalent idea
that fertilizers act in the mere capacity of
furnishing plant food, and hold that they
do this only to certain extent, but that
their main function consists in celebrating
and making plant food out Of ingredients
found in the soil"
Now although the pursuit OF this study
is measurably within the power Of every
man, yet to attain to a high degree Of sue.
cess requires special talent combined with
opportunity.
The talent comes by the endowment of
God and by education, the opportunity is by
the furnishing of man.
Now it happens by fortuitous circumstan.
ces, that we have the combination of the
two under the most favorable conditions,
and we beg in our observations we find
that cotton, the cereals and grasses, will
not thrive except in soil where there is an
excess of Nitrogen.
At the same time, we find that Legumi.
noids, (peas, beans, &c. are indifferent to
Nitrogen, but that they require minerals
ashes, say-in othe. words, an Ash Ele.
ment. We find that cotton, the cereals and
grasses, leaves the land bereft of Nitrogen; ;
but that the Leguminoids, under this spe.
c6c treatment, leave the land replenshed
wit Nitrogen.
Now this as a most significant fact, and
it is indeed, the key to the whole problem
BY this, it wound seem, that just as in the
animal kingdom, one animal is made sub
scrvicnt to the life of another, so in the veg.
etablo kingdom.
AS herbvorous animals are food for the
Carnivorous, so Leguminous plants are
meant by nature to be food for the Grant
Iacious. If, then, We want to grow cereals
and prossns N fnllows that wp nuct loorp