THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. APRIL, 1858. PLATE I. A LINCOLN CART STALLION, THE PROPERTY OF MR. T. B. T. HILDYARD, OF FLINTHAM HALL, NEWARK. This horse took the first prize of 30 sovs., as the best of all the stallions for agricultural purposes, at the Salisbury Meeting of the Royal Agricultural Society of England. He was entered and shown at Chelmsford the year previous, but drafted out, as it was said, from not being a good mover. His action since then has been wonderfully improved, and certainly at Salisbury there was not a horse in his class at all equal to him in his paces. He stepped as light and lively as a pony. Matchless has, however, other strong recommendations-a splendid head, neck, and shoulders, good old-fashioned quarters, and extraordinary size and substance. His legs, perhaps, are not quite so clean as they might be. But the greatest of all his attractions, to the common run of sight-seers, is a most beautiful mane, fine in quality, and extraordinary for its length. As a show horse it certainly gave him a most imposing appearance; and as a picturesque noble-looking animal, the Suffolks and other mere utilitarians had no chance with him. Matchless, bred by Mr. Haytoe, of Simperingham Fen, near Folkingham, in 1851, is by the King of the County, out of a Champion mare. PLATE II. THE LATE MR. THOMAS KIRBY, OF YORK. This well-known dealer and sportsman, whose name has for nearly sixty years been connected with English stock, was born at Osbaldwick, near York, in the August of 1770. As he was born and brought up a Catholic, the parish register contains no entry of his birth, and owing to the lapse of years, he has forgotten the exact date. From his very boyhood, "the current of his being set to" horses; and when he was barely 21, he made his first voyage to Russia in charge of a cargo of them, and entered the service of Count Poltrowsky, who had upwards of 100 brood mares in his paddocks. For a long series of years his life consisted in perpetual Russian voyages, sometimes twice in a summer, and occasionally with two ship-loads of horses. His two sons as well as himself had once a very narrow escape from being "washed away in the flood" at St. Petersburgh, when every horse but one in his stable perished, and that was floated into a sort of garret, from whence its exit was of the most precarious kind. So great was the favour with which the Grand Dukes regarded him, that one of them entrusted him to smuggle over some English porter, and he was wont to carry it by a bottle at a time to the palace, when he went ostensibly to chat with them about horses. On one occasion the cork came out with a rush, and if the sentinel had not good-naturedly accepted his explanation, as to its being "frisky beer," he would, as the Grand Duke laughingly told him, have been sent off for a certainty to Siberia, for a season's wholesome meditation on "Barclay and Perkin's entire." Orville was the first blood horse he ever purchased, 2,000 gs. being the price, and he proved a most successful venture. Lottery, whom he sold for £1,600, to go to France, was another immense favourite. Bourbon also came into his hands from Lord George Cavendish, for 1,100 gs., Brutandorf for 500 gs., Muley Moloch for 1,500 gs., St. Giles for 1,000 gs. (sold to the Americans for just the same price), General Chasse for 2,250 gs., Van Tromp for 2,000 gs., and Lanercost for 3,000 gs. Otterington's price OLD SERIES.] U [VOL. XLVIII.—No. 4. was 800 gs., and he put him by for a year, and then finding his form was gone, sold him to Lord Jersey and Sir John Shelley, in whose stable he broke his thigh. He also purchased Phoenix from his lordship, and sold him to Mr. Ferguson, of Harker Lodge, near Carlisle; and it was to Lord Jersey that he effected his most successful sale of a yearling by Lottery out of Tambourine for 800 gs. His prices for yearlings seldom exceeded £200, and he generally sold the produce of his five mares at Doncaster. In his hey-day he engaged them pretty deeply, but he was very much sickened of breeding for the turf by the difficulties he encountered in making the vendees pay up the forfeits if the purchases turned out badly, or the contingencies when they won. Hernandez, whom he sold into France with Lanercost, was his last blood-sire purchased. Mr. Kirby died at York of old age, on Sunday the 28th of last February. Two sons by his first marriage survive him; and about fourteen or fifteen years ago he had married the widow of Mr. Sykes, the well-known trainer. The Post and the Paddock will speak further to the adventures of this old English worthy, especially in his dealings with the Emperor of all the Russias. BARLEY. BY CUTHBERT W. JOHNSON, ESQ., F.R.S. In this the time of barley sowing, at which we are again arrived, we can hardly direct our attention to a more useful agricultural theme. It will be to our advantage in several ways if we spend an April evening in such an enquiry. This will be the more practically useful since there are now several eminent chemists who have lately published the results of their valuable and most laborious investigations on the barley plant. These true friends of their country have examined, not only the produce of barley grown on the same soil for a series of seasons (both unmanured, and also manured with various fertilizers), but they have extended their researches to the varying composition of the seed of barley produced on different soils. It will, happily for the better understanding of our subject, be unnecessary to do more than epitomise the invaluable matter of reports, which ever and anon almost seem intended by their cloudy verbiage to test the farmer's ability in deep diggings. The reader will, in the paper to which I am about to refer, find abundant materials of the highest practical value. He will ever, in commencing such studies, feel assured that although in the majority of instances the chemist's labours elucidate the correctness of long-established practices; yet in others they shadow forth new objects for the agricultural student's cautious trials; and, in any case, he will not forget the great truth, that although we have long been steadily increasing our knowledge of the habits of barley, yet that there are many questions, with regard to this plant, that yet remain to be explained -mysteries, which when hereafter made clear, will probably give rise to other equally valuable and interesting practical researches. The growth of barley on the same land for a series of years is an important question, which has for several years past occupied the attention of Messrs. J. B. Lawes and Gilbert "Jour. Roy. Ag. So." vol. xviii, p. 454). They set apart for these peculiar trials, which commenced in 1852, about five acres of ground at Rothamsted, in Hertfordshire. These were divided into nearly square plots, of about one-fifth of an acre each. The land had grown clover in 1849, wheat in 1850, and barley dressed with sulphate of ammonia in 1851. It was, therefore, as the reporters remark, "in a somewhat exhausted condition, as far as the after-growth of grain was concerned, and it was hence in a suitable state for testing the effects of different manures on the barley crop." In these trials two plots, one at either of the experimental land, were left unmanured, and it is the mean result of these that is given in the subsequent little tables. The farm-yard dung employed was from the open yard, and not from highly-fed animals. The "mixed alkalies" comprised per acre: 300 lbs. of sulphate of potash. 200 lbs. of sulphate of soda. 100 lbs. of sulphate of magnesia. The superphosphate of lime was composed per acre of 200 lbs. of calcined bone-dust. 150 lbs. of sulphuric acid (sp. grav. 1.7. The "mixed minerals" consisted of a mixture of the superphosphate and the "mixed alkalies." The seed, the Chevalier, was always drilled at the rate of 2 bushels per acre in 1852 and 1853, and 7 pecks per acre in 1854-5-6 and '7. In the following report the produce is given in bushels and pecks. First, then, the produce of the soil entirel yunmanured was, Annual average per 2 33 35 56 48 32 60 212321 36 2 38 0 36 01 40 60 33 53 21 37 62 In studying these very valuable results, the farmer will not fail to remark the great influence of different seasons in modifying the profitable results obtained by different dressings. Our reporters allude to this, when they observe that from the pervading influence of season, by which the produce may be double one year that of another, even with the same set of conditions supplied by the farmer, and which moreover, when unfavourable, the crop most highly manured suffers most, it results that the amount of produce obtained for a given outlay in manure may be only half as much in some seasons as in others. Then, again, it is evident that some of these nitrogenous fertilizers were applied in excessive proportions. The reporters, indeed, observe, "The unmanured, and the only mineral manured portions, as a rule, stood up till the time of cutting. The crops with nitrogen equal to 50 lbs. of ammonia per acre were generally more or less laid, as were also those grown by farmyard manaure. Those having nitrogen equal to 100 lbs. or more of ammonia per acre were invariably laid, and in every year excepting in 1857 very much, and injuriously so, the crops being too heavy to bear any moderate amount of rain about or after the time of heading." The effect of these manures in influencing the period of ripening is also a material consideration. The "mixed alkalies" it seems, whether used alone, or in admixture with nitrogenous manures, invariably somewhat retarded the ripening. Super0 phosphate of lime, on the contrary, whether used alone or in combination with other manures, always promoted early ripening. The effect, Messrs. Lawes and Gilbert add, was most striking. So much so, indeed, that latterly it has been thought desirable to cut the crops at different times, as they came ripe; those dressed with superphosphate of lime, or with farmyard manure, coming to the scythe more than a week earlier than the others. It will presently be seen, that the superphosphate had a marked effect on the quantity of produce also, and especially on the tendency to corn. The general conclusions at which these scientific cultivators arrive, will accord pretty well with those of the farmers who carefully study the above tabular statements, viz., 1. That the use of exclusively mineral manures, and especially those containing phosphoric acid, annually increase the produce of barley. 2. That with barley grown continuously on the same land, nitrogenous manures have a much more striking effect than mineral manures. 3. That by the annual supply of nitrogenous manures alone (nitrate of soda or ammoniacal salts) larger successive crops, both of corn and straw, were in these experiments obtained, than by the annual use of fourteen tons of farmyard manure. 4. That within certain limits, even on the comparatively exhausted soil employed in these experiments, nitrate of soda, ammoniacal salts, and rapecake, all increase the produce of barley approximately in proportion to the amounts of nitrogen they respectively supplied. 5. That the effect of a given amount of nitrogen, if not excessive, is considerably increased by the addition of certain mineral manures, especially those containing phosphates. The composition of barley (examined chiefly with regard to its nutritive properties) grown on different soils, is an interesting branch of the inquiry that has recently engaged the attention of Professor Anderson (Trans. High. Soc., 1858, p. 287). He tells his reader the objects which he chiefly had in view in instituting his experiments, when he observes, that every one who has directed even a limited attention to agricultural chemistry must be familiar with the subdivision of the nutritive principles existing in plants, and required for the food of animals, into two great groups-of albuminous and respiratory principles; the former serving to produce the flesh or muscular fibre of the animals, and the latter being partly consumed in the system in the process of respiration for the purpose of maintaining the animal heat, and partly accumulated as fat to form a reserve against the temporary deprivation of food from want or disease. A few of the mean results obtained by Dr. Anderson will be found in the succeeding tables :The water per cent. in Chevalier barley was, in the specimens examined a sharp gravel (554 lbs. do.) a light sandy soil (55 lbs. do.) The albuminous compounds in the same specimens of barley were, in that from 7 09 6 91 10.30 8.22 8.10 The amount per cent. of respiratory compounds in these specimens were, in that from In comparing the value of barley with other grain, as Dr. Anderson concludes, it is obvious that it bears a high nutritive value. In the proportion of albuminous compounds it stands on a level with wheat grown in this country, but naturally from the presence of the husk it is below it in the quantity of respiratory elements; the relative importance of these two groups, however, in a nutritive point of view, has not yet been clearly decided. These chemical examinations of the composition of barley, and of the effect of various artificial dressings, I repeat, will well repay the farmers for their most careful consideration. The reader should, indeed, ever banish from his mind any lingering suspicion that science has already achieved all the aid that can be rendered to the cultivator of the soil. Let us all rather feel well assured of one certain fact, that many a mystery in the phenomena of vegetation is yet to be explained by the chemical philosopher, that will, perhaps, to the end of time, steadily add to the power and stimulate the efforts of still more enlightened agriculturists than even those of our age. |