Trying to Please Everybody.

Te Aroha News, Volume III, Issue 134, 26 December 1885, Page 6

Trying to Please Everybody.

It fe/certain tliat you, cannot please ey©sbody, ans it is f4 cMaiu i ,that displease others j/but .all as little/ as mip^Wte^irt^S^? may not^acauire.^ , yeputehon Jqr; great cpmmo^senss^and y^u >pphkefo^enough, , imcpurse jof r A./^

Ynospheric fowl, which, as its 'frame implies, U den veil frdm thB Atmosphere. As to atmospheric fodd^ when a nun sees a big tree or a croj> of wheat he naturally asks what it is made of. Take a tree for example. Suppose you burn it to ashes. The weight of the ashes Vhich remained wouftd not amount to 'more than a few pounds. The ashes represented the mineral matter which the 'tree took from the soil, and the ro\nainder Was chiefly carbon, ofch'erwije Icnown as charcoal. AnJ where did this 'come $rdra ? The ntmospliere. Tlie charcoal in the tree was greater than 'eyexytMnfc else in it, and that was supplied by the atmosphere. And how did the tree get its charcOalt The air we' breathe contains a heavy gas called carbonic 'acid &«s. 10,000 gallons of air four gallons of carbonic acid. It did fcotgo down to the lowest lerel^and tend form a layer by itself on the surface fof the ground, but penetrated away into the highest Teaches of the atmosphere. And Where did the carbonic acid come frrcfmt Fiifcfc 'of all from the breathing \>l anfafcals. Every breath contains 3 cent of carbonic acid. Thiak of the number of animals breathing carbonic ' acid into the atmosphere night and dayl -j "Secondly, there wns the burning of fires. When one ton of coal is "burned it produces from two to three tons of carbonic tocid, that is to say,*cne ton Of coal produces from two to two and a half tons \>f capbonic acid gas. think of all the household fires in all parts of the globe 'constantly sending their carbonic acid into the atmosphere ! Thirdly, th«jy had Jftie burning of limestone. Fourthly, /there is Underneath in the interior of the 'earth enormous deposits ol limestone. acid is generated through the faction of volcanoes and centres of heat 'on the limestone, and the gas escapes "through fissures and immense crevices X>n various parts of the earth's surface. There were six or seven time's more 'carbonic acid gas 'escaping through these' ■fissures than Jroni all other Sources put 'together. Now as to the 'effect of ali tbfs carbon on the growth of plant*. fie had given them the various sources !from which we derive this Valuable constituent, and of course it uifrst be titilised as quickly us it comes fourth. Supposing there were no means of removing ft from the atmosphere, the atmosphere Vronld become so poisonous that it would \}e A unbreatheableby animals, and animal life in any form would be impossible. Tlfe carbonic acid was taken rip by plants in the following manner-; The green part Of living plants is all day long drawing in carbonic gas from the "through various Small mouths in the inside of each leaf or \*\ ide. After 'the carbonic acid gas p.-^ses into the plants it is distributed, mid its functions are performed under the influence «/f sunlight. The lecturer then explained the relat'onship between and animals, and the gases necessary to the existence Of each. The »u;ount 'of progress made by plants depi rided upon the aWmdanfce of their foliage, as 'the foliage so to speak was the lungs of the plants through which they breathed the fearbon necessary to their existence. Take a blue gum seed for instance and place it underneath the surface and go away say to England for •2U years, when you come back it would be a big tree 40ft or #Oft high with all its branches hunting in the air for more taibonic acid. All that big tree diJ not fcowe from the .little seed*. What took jplace was simply this. The seed begins \n thfrtws Us rriots <iowti into the ground, and, the cheruicul action proceeding, itfe little leaflefs soon peep above th'o surVad?, dpening their tiny mouths and breathing in carbonic aciJ, ai\4 from this source they derive their grow/th. The big tree which .you see is cha^cbal and Hrater, the constituents of all plants, suj^jposing a tree weighing about 10 tdns, is 'cut 'down on the top of a mountain whefe it will not be interfered with by any animal, let it remain there in the 'open air for say 500 years and then go and Bee what remains of it. It would be found that the carbon was slightly oxydised, and that the carbonic acid gas Would be Whistling through the air and drawn in by some other plants. There would simply be found where the trdes once lay a few spots of earthy matter. The most important constituent perhaps would be phosphate of lime, of which phosphorus is the chief constituent; Then there was also 1 lime, magnesia, potash and soda. There were of -course others, such as silica, oxide of irohj &c. . Every hundred tons Qf clay soil contain as much as 30 per cent, of^ allumina. Clay did not go into plants, nor was there a particle of clay in any of iis« We were made of anything else yon like but clay, and the story that we were only bits of clay was nothing more than. a popular fallacy; The lecturer explained at considerable length and with great clearness how this important constituent entered into the composition of the soil. Phosphate of lime was the great Btimuldm. o f both ahiraal and vegetable lifej Evt*y little frlabt w>s a laboratory in~ itself. Every bullock I fattened on a piece of ground todk away | in his bones so much phosphate, which i passes into his system through tn« food which he takes. He also is a laboratory in himself. Take for instancetwo calves about three months did, having the* same weight of bone arid which have beda reared on uil\\k: Kill one of them and burn the bories id .ashes, and say it cofttairis one pound Weight of phosphate of lime: Turn oufc. the other fellow, for three years and then . burn bis bones to ashes, and the phosphate, of lime will -be found td weigh ten pounds; Tlie 1 atmosphere and the water do riot contain it, . therefore* he' must get it froin*the soil. There is, in fact; phoshate of lime in the reiy milk/ Plants

take the jpbosphftte from 'the tuirth,, and animals fi^oiVi the plants . The phosphate of lime In the soil Vras very limited, and ho believed the human race were making a grent mistake in \vasttng it so unnecessarily. There was in fact n terrible waste daily going on, and the human race would sooner or later have to take steps to stop that waste, and devote this valuable constituent to the purpose for which uature intended it. In Waikafco where the soil was really good, one ton weight of soil contained very probably-, soniethtng: lil^ one pound weight of phosphorous. It was an ea9y calculation to ascertain how long it would take to exhaust the supply. Five bushels of wheat 'contain one jiound of phosphorus, therefore a crop of 50 bushels would contain 10 pounds of phosphorus means 55lbs of phosphate of lime, and that means Something like llOlbs of raw bone. About 120lbs of guano would furnish us with the requisite phosphate of lime idr '50 bushels of wheat". This amount was requisite so as to leave the ground, so far as the . phosphate is concerned,, in the same condition of richness as it was before ] you put your wheat in it. tiniest this | was done the richest soil in New Zeal- , and after a number of wheat crops i would soon dwindle to absolute baren- ! ness. It was not wheat alone tha"t absorbed the phosphate of lime, but every other crop you put in. Look back on the times when Palestine and those, other Asiatic countries were the great nations of the earth, say two or three thousand years ago. What had become of these once mighty nations now ? I They had tised up all their phosphorus. The phosphate of lime had been extracted from the soil and sent down to i the sea in the sewage of the country, j Here it got absorbed by the sea plants j which were eaten by the fishes, which were food for the wild vultures of the ! sea, which deposited it on the barren islands and coasts of the pacific ocean. And England recognising its great Value was now sending her ships, which every year brought large cargoes of this i valuable manure into her ports. Pales- i tine at one trne was a very thriving country, with a soil incomparably rich : and fertile. Though it was not so large in area afc the valley of Walkato, Still it was able 'to support no less than 300,000 fighting men, and gYeat big powerful j fellows they were. They were full of phosphate of lime. 200 bushels were grown to the acre in those days on land which would not now groifr anything. They did not know anything about chemistry in those days, aud so this waste went on for some hundreds of years, and Palestine now is Only fcble to support a few straggling Arabs. — Wai- j fcato Time?.