haddock and cod, and this nutritious chemical compound-this sulphate of fish, be valuable to him either to apply to his own farm or garden at home, or dispose of to his neighbors.

I will not trouble you now with any more "fish-stories," but beg leave to turn your attention to the element in which the fish reside, viz: the ocean itself. And here I would observe, that much may be learned by studying the operations of nature, in the application of her laws-in the growth and sustenance of plants in their native or natural localities. Some plants scem to be equally at home in almost any situation-that is to saythey will live and do very well on the upland, or the lowland-on dry or wet soil. Such for instance is the common alder, although flourishing best in the lowlands, yet it by no means refuses to grow on highlands-in fact in almost any lands or latitudes in America.

On the other hand, others are more particular as it regards location. The seaboard has some plants and shrubs that do not thrive very well at a distance from the salt water. The red cedar, savin and the bayberry bush are seldom seen growing in the interior of Maine, and I have been told that the common bayberry or wax myrtle never grows forty miles from sea-water, and I have never found it in the State except upon the seaboard. Some of these do not grow so near the ocean as to have their roots wet by the salt water, and yet there seems to be something invigorating and congenial to them in the spray and salt exhalations and fogs from the sea.

It seems to us that a hint may be taken from these and some other facts. Every plant flourishes best and produces most if placed in a condition where it can be supplied with all the requirements of its nature. The asparagus is a maritime plant. Its native home is on the shore where it can have a porous but cool soil for its roots, where the salt tide can occasionally flow around it. In accordance with a knowledge of this fact, gardeners have used common salt as a dressing for it with good

*In fish manure, the bones of which consist of phosphate of lime, remain in the soil a long time after the animal matter has disappeared, and act favorably on vegetation. One of the best farmers in Rhode Island informed me that he regarded the bones of menhaden as the most permanent and valuable of manures, and he extracted the oil from the flesh for sale, and used the refuse for manure on his land to great advantage.-Dr. Jackson's Address-Transactions of Mass. Ag. Society for 1850,

advantage. Now would it not be better if it could be watered with water taken from the ocean itself. Common salt is but one of the 'ingredients of sea-water, and it seems to us that if you wished to treat a maritime plant to its native beverage, it would be better to give it in full, rather than with an imitation of it made up but with a small portion of its real ingredients.

Again, you have all of you heard of, and many of you undoubtedly suffered by the ravages of the curculio among your plums. This is an exceedingly troublesome insect, or bug as we Yankees call it, that breeds in the plum and prevents its ripening. Hitherto it has baffled the operations and arts and devices of man to counteract its mischief. It lays its egg in the young plum where the worm or maggot feeds until sufficiently large to change to the perfect or winged state. The plum drops off in an unripe state, the worm, or larva, as it is sometimes called, creeps into the ground where it rolls itself up into the chrysalis form, and in a short time comes out with wing and beak and all the apparatus to continue its mischief. Of the whole plum crop raised in the United States, the curculio lays its claim to three-fourths of them every year, and some years it succeeds in taking pretty much the whole of them. Now I wish to make one suggestion for the consideration of those interested in the plum culture, and who live on the sea-side, and request that by their experiments and observations they may corroborate or refute my views and theory. I do not now reside in a situation where I can test them very conveniently. It is this: if the ground where the plum trees stand be saturated with sea-water, will it not destroy the curculio? I have been led to this query from recollecting the fact, that when a boy of the Old Colony, on the south shore of Massachusetts bay, we seldom failed of gathering abundant crops of beach plums which grew upon the shores and flats and reefs in that region where the tides could cover their roots, in some places every day, and in all places occasionally. I do not recollect of ever seeing or hearing that this variety was ever troubled with the curculio. If it be found by experiment that sea-water applied often to the roots of our larger and highly cultivated plums, should be injurious, might not the root of the beach plum be used as a stock upon which to engraft the more valued kinds, and these

be washed occasionally with sea-water?

This can be tested

by those of you who reside in the shore towns. There are, however, a few facts which lead to the belief that an application of this kind of irrigation will not prove fatal to the plum.

The late Mr. Pond of Cambridgeport, well known as a suc cessful nurseryman, cultivated plum trees on some lowlands near the shore. During a heavy easterly storm, the tide rose to an uncommon height, and overflowed his plum plantation. He considered the whole as ruined, but, to his astonishment, they produced a most abundant crop, and continued so to do for some years.

From this fact, it was thought that salt would be an excellent dressing for plum trees, and an application of it is oftentimes of much service-but allow me to repeat the question-will not an occasional drenching of "full-blooded" sea-water be far better?

Experiments of this kind come within the legitimate province of this society, and if instituted and carried out carefully and faithfully, could not fail to elicit facts, which, whether they cor roborated or nullified the theory just mentioned would be valuable as establishing truths not yet clearly developed.

I wish to be fairly understood, however, in regard to this matter. Let none of your York wags go away and tell that the York County Agricultural Society invited a Kennebecker to come over and advise them to water their gardens with seawater, and fatten their pigs on dock mud!! I wish to suggest that there are probably more fertilizers in the sea, than man has yet made use of, and that it is a legitimate business of this. Society situate as they are, on the borders of the ocean, to institute experiments with a view of eliciting truths in regard to any new applications that may be made from this immense reservoir of mineral, animal and vegetable matter. I do this because I verily believe the whole use or uses of this vast body of water, mingled with saline matter by the hand of God himself -so uniform in its proportion all over the world-have not yet been fully ascertained. I know that authors and every body else will say, that these ingredients serve to prevent its becoming putrid, as it would, from the prodigious quantities of animal and vegetable matters contained in it. If this mere

preventing putridity were the case, why is it necessary to have

so great a variety of materials?

Why, what are some of the ingredients of it?

To this you may add a little iodine, and a little bomine, and some other saline matters of minor amount.

Now if prevention of decomposition were the only design of this mixture-it is a failure. Would you risk the safety of your beef if you pickled it down with nothing but sea-water? Nay, let the whole ocean become calm, and its waters have no motion, and see how long this array of salts would keep it pure -how long would it be before the whole surface from the equator to the polar ices, and "from the river to the ends of the earth," would be one festering mass of corruption? It is indebted as much to its restless motion for preservation, as to its saline matters-to the winds that constantly ruffle its surface, and to the never resting tides which with their ceaseless flow and ebb, allow it no rest by night or by day, or from one year's end to another. If these salts are necessary to its preservation, what prevents lakes Superior and MichiganHuron, Erie and Ontario, from becoming putrid? Why is it that the mighty St. Lawrence, into which these lakes pour their gathered waters, instead of sparkling with invigorating and health giving elements is not a moving mass of liquid pestilence? You find no common salt nor sulphates nor muriates nor iodine nor bromine in them, and yet they are as crowded with animal and vegetable matters, in proportion to their volume, as is the ocean, and are as lively and as healthy and as pure as the great sea itself. If, then, as I said before, if these salts were put in to keep it pure, it is a decided failure-but the Almighty never fails in his designs. He must therefore have placed these materials here for some other purpose, and perhaps, many other purposes than the one generally supposed. What these are, I am not certain; but reasoning from analogy, I have thought

that Agriculture might derive benefit from the investigation, and have ventured the hints thus thrown out for your consideration.*

It may not be unprofitable, Mr. President, while together at this time, to consider briefly the intimate connection there is between the comfort and strength of our physical or animal life and those vegetables that constitute our bread crop; and also in what manner some crops may be used to nourish those of another kind.

It is a law of nature that every animal of whatever kind or description, must eat or die-or, in other words, every animal from man down to the lowest worm, must be continually supplied with material, called food, from which its various organs can derive by digestion and assimilation, the various kinds of matter which make up the different parts of its body. This is the first thing it requires when it begins life-it is the last thing it lets go of when it ceases to exist. This food must be

* Since this address was delivered, the following has been published in the New England Farmer. It gives the result of an accidental application of sea-water by inundation. The results show the efficiency of sea-water, for good or for evil, as it may be judiciously or injudiciously applied.

Effects of Salt Water upon Trees and Shrubs-BY 8. P. FOWLER.-I thought it would be interesting to publish in the Farmer some facts in regard to the effects of salt water upon trees, shrubs and plants, caused by the flowing of the tide over a portion of my garden, in the great storm of April 16, 1851. Such opportunities for noticing the inundations of the sea seldom occur. The garden was overflowed by the water about three hours, and the roots were laid bare by the motion of the waves, so that it became necessary to cover them with earth. Two Isabella and two fox grape vines were killed, and those that survived, put forth their leaves late in the season. The apple and pear trees did not appear the following summer to be much injured, although the putting forth of their leaves was somewhat retarded in the spring. The plum trees were apparently benefited by the salt water. Several kinds of currant bushes were badly washed by the water; one of them, the Missouri large fruited, had put forth its leaves; but they did not appear to suffer. A number of native shrubs and plants were submerged, but two only were destroyed, the Staphylea and Viburnum lantana. A fine Kolreuteria, a Chinese tree, was not injured. The strawberry plants did not suffer, but a bed of spearmint, that by its spreading had become troublesome, was destroyed, whereas a bed of peppermint escaped. The Crown Imperials and Narcissuses were six inches in height when overtaken by the water. They never grew after this period, and exhibited weak flowers. All the weeds and grasses sustained no injury whatever. The apple trees washed by the tide, did not suffer so much from the canker worm as those not reached by the water. I could see no effect of the salt water upon the curculios. The earth worms were all destroyed, leaving their holes in the ground, as they were reached by the tide, and were driven by the waves to high water mark, where they laid dead in great numbers. The sea overflowed a garden in England, in November, 1824, and remained upon it for twenty-four hours. The result was, the improvement of the asparagus beds, and the cherry trees, in the following year, produced a numerous crop of cherries, which tasted, however, so very salt, they could not be eaten, although very fine in appearance. These trees all died the following year. An inundation of the sea occurred in Europe in 1825, when the oak, the mulberry, pear and some other trees did not suffer, neither did the asparagus, onions, celery, &c., for they were never finer or more luxuriant. But the vines and gooseberries contracted a salt taste, and the apples, cherries, elms, poplars, willows, &c., pushed out a few leaves and soon died.