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than the other parts of this work, we fhall transcribe what our ingenious Author fays

Of the Nourishment of Plants.

• A plant will grow in fand alone, moistened with pure diftilled water, and in the pureft air, but not fo luxuriantly as in a rich foil.

A plant will also grow better in a mixture of fand and clay, where the tenacity is adapted to the pufhing power of its root than in fand alone; and will alfo grow better if a proper quantity of water be applied, according to the difpofition of its roots to refift putrefaction, but with both these advantages, it will not flourish fo well as in a rich foil.

If, in a proper mixture of fand and clay, a plant is properly fupplied with water, it will grow better than in the fame mixture exposed to the weather, and the chances of being too moift or too dry; but it will grow ftill better in a rich foil.

There is therefore in a rich foil fomething independant of texture, or the retention of water, which contributes to the flourishing of plants.

• A rich foil contains fubftances infoluble in water; or substances foluble in water.

The fubftances infoluble in water cannot enter the veffels of the roots of plants, and therefore can only contribute either to the texture, or the production of fubftances foluble in water.

The fubftances infoluble in water may neceffarily only be fand or clay; thofe at any time found are, Sand;-Clay ;-Afbeftes Talc; &c.-Calcareous earth;-Magnefia;-Earth of allum;-Calces of metals; particularly iron and copper; and-The fibres of vegetables.

Thofe foluble in water that are found in all rich foils, are Muci. lage;-Nitrous ammoniac ;-Nitrous felenites ;-Common ammoniac ;-Fixt ammoniac;

Thefe fubftances all get into the plant along with the water; and the falts are found in the juices of the plant, unchanged.

A mucilage is alfo found, but very different from that contained in foils.

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Therefore a plant may be nourished by pure water and air alone; but it will be more luxuriant, if it also abforbs, and digefts, a quantity of gelatinous mucilage.

Richness of the foil depends on

First, A proper degree of tenacity, which is procured by

(a) A mixture of clay with fand, or any other earth, fo that it fhall contain between one fourth of clay, and three fourths.

(b) Mucilage, which gives friability to the clay, and tenacity to fand.

(c) The quality of the clay, the more diffufible it is in water, it gives the better texture to the foil.

Secondly, The quantity of mucilage, the more there is in a foil, the better.

One grain in a thousand will be of advantage, as it will give a fenfible tenacity to a fufficient quantity of water, to moisten the foil thoroughly.

Thirdly, The quantity of fubftances capable of being converted into mucilage. 7

⚫ (Vide

(Vide mucilage, page 42.)

Fourthly, The matters in the foil difpofing thefe to be converted. into mucilage.

Thefe are, Calcareous earth;-Earthy falts.

. If a foil be rich, a fmall proportion of an alkali, neutral falt, cauftic calcareous earth or earthy falt (except the faits of allum) will improve it, but thefe fubftances, unless they be putrefcents, hurt plants growing in a poor foil.

Thefe fubitances may be faid to be forcers, in as much as they not only tend immediately to produce a larger crop, but deftroy the mucilage.

They may act by deftroying the weak fibres of the roots, and occafioning them to push out more numerous and ftronger ones. They may prevent the evaporation of the water.

They may deftroy infects.

Poffibly, they may affift the digeftion of the plant.

A very fmall proportion of them, produces an effect.

In manuring poor foils, we are therefore to render them of a proper texture, by adding clay or fand, where it can be done fufficiently cheap, taking care that they be free from pyrites, and it is to be obferved, that lefs clay will be useful in fandy foils, than fand in clayfoils.

FROST by the expanfive power of the cryftallization of the water, breaks down the maffes, which form in ftiff foils.

We are to apply gelatinous mucilage, or fubftances from whence it may be formed, or fubftances forwarding the formation of it. (Vide mucilage, page 42.)

Thefe are enriching manures.

And in rich foils, we may venture to apply the forcing manures, as otherwise we should not have the whole effects of the mucilage. Any defect of texture may be made up by mucilage, and the alteration clay undergoes on culture, but the defect of mucilage cannot be made up by texture.

A foil,, if it have all the properties of a rich one, may have thefe counteracted by its containing poifonous fublances, which are, First, Metallic falts, or pyrites.

Secondly, Salts containing earth of allum (or pyrites.)

Thirdly, Acids uncombined.

Fourthly, Any other falt in too large a proportion.

The first, fecond, and third, may be deftroyed by quick lime; the fourth is got the better of by time, and the washing the foil with water, by the rains, unless there be a fresh fupply from fprings. The advantages of draining a foil, are the preventing the water from-Rotting the feeds;-Rotting the roots, especially at the time. of flowering;-Taking off the effects of the mucilage, by too great dilution.

The advantages of FALLOWING are,

The converfion of the vegetable fibres into mucilage, by deftroying their life, and expofing them to the air.

The destroying weeds, by giving their feeds an opportunity of growing, killing them, and converting them into mucilage.

The decompofing pyrites, and metallic and alluminous falts,
Rev. Mar. 1771.

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A very poor foil will be but little benefited by fallowing, in as much as there is nothing contained in it capable of being converted into mucilage, except the rain water, it is better to employ an en. riching crop.

Fallowing for feveral years would deftroy a foil, as it would convert the whole putrefcent fubftances into mucilage, and that mucilage into falts, and thefe would be decompofed.

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The giving an opportunity to deftroy the weeds, cut the fibres of the roots fo as to make them branch out again, and loosen the earth about the roots, and throwing the earth on the stems, so as to make fresh roots break out.

The faving fuperfluous feed and sowing the ground more equally.
The giving a free paffage to the air.

It is not yet determined how far the rows fhould be from one another, nor how thick the plants fhould be fown; it will require that they should be fown thinner to produce a great crop of feeds, or roots, than a great quantity of herbs.

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Quere, Is there any difference in the direction of the rows?

Enriching crops are fuch as fupply the foil with matters capable of being converted into mucilage, they do this

First, By exfudation from the roots.

Secondly, By leaving the roots which will putrify.

Thirdly, If ploughed in, the whole plant will putrify; and it is to be observed in this cafe, that the plants fhould always be cut down when in full vigour, and while the exfudation is still taking place ftrongly.

If the juices exfuded are very aftringent, they counteract the good effects of this method of culture by preventing the putrefaction.

A lift of MANURES.

First, Those furnishing mucilage or fubftances convertable into As, Glue;-Skins ;-Hair ;-Horns ;-Bones;-Rags, &c. &c. -Dung of animals ;-Infects.

Vegetable putrified fubftances; these go through the facharine, vinous, and acetous fermentations firft; fo that a dunghill is nor fufficiently putrified, until the heat is over; but it is better to putrify too little, than too much, as in the firft cafe, the putrefaction may be continued in the foil; in the fecond, the mucilage is converted into falts, and cannot be restored.

Putrefcible vegetable fubftances: it is to be observed that vegetable fubftances that are of too folid a texture, as wood, putrify with great difficulty into a mucilage, and alfo thofe that have aftringent juices, and such as have lain in the earth a confiderable time, and fugar.

Enriching crops.

Secondly, Manures converting putrefcible fubftances into mucilage.

Calcareous earth, as Marle ;-Chalk ;-Effete lime:

Earthy falts, in the dung of fowls, rabbits, &c.-Too putrid dunghills;-Sea water in fmall quantity.

Thirdly,

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Thirdly, Forcing manures, as, Quick lime;-Fixt alkalis in vegetable afhes ;-Neutral falts which do not affilt putrefaction;Earthy falts as above.'

POETICAL.

D.

Art. 16. Verfes addressed to John Wilkes, Efq; on his Arrival at
Lynn. 4to. 6d. Whittingham at Lynn. Baldwin in London. 1771.
Amidst the lamentable defection of numbers of the patriotic band,
a fon of Freedom and the Mufes has kindly ftepped forth, to cheer
the deferted leader in his courfe, and to ftrew, with the choiceft,
flowers he could felect, the rugged, and now, alas! nearly defolate
paths of patriotifm. He prophetically holds forth to his hero the
noble and high-founding titles of patriot and guardian of the laws,
which, he forefees, will be adjudged to him by pofterity; and makes
it a matter of comfort to him that, in thefe our days, in this de-
clining age,' he is in no danger of being curfed with grandeur, or
difgraced by the favours of the crown:

On thee fhall favour ne'er its vengeance pour,

Or on thy head the curfe of grandeur fhow'r;
In courts no villain teach the civil leer,

No titled blockhead hail thee "brother peer."

If Mr. Wilkes receives any confolation from this laft declaration of the prophetic mufe, he is indeed a patriot of a very different from any that have appeared within our memories. As complexion to the event, however, we would take the mufe's word for a thoufand pounds.

Though these verses, as we have been informed, were actually prefented to Mr. Wilkes, on his late arrival at Lynn, to take up the freedom voted to him by that borough, they are by no means however, as their title may feem to import, of a private or local nature, nor bear any particular allufion to the object of that vifit. They may accordingly be understood, and read with equal profit and delight, in any part of the three kingdoms; Scotland perhaps excepted, from whence (if we are to believe our poet, defcribing the late fuppofed incurfions of defpotifm into this country) tyranny who long had flept,

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In northern ice immured, now forward stept;
accompanied by flavery, corruption, rage, with their attendant
chains and fcorpions. Heaven however perceiving the danger of
Britannia from this hellish crew, at length fends her guardian
poor
angel to her rescue :

A Wilkes, a hero came :-ferenely brave,
Dauntless he rush'd a finking land to save,

Chaftifed ambition with victorious hand,
And once again with freedom bleft the land.

We
If this be true, bleffings on him, we fay, with all his infirmities:
fuch public fervices would cover a multitude of private fins.
rejoice too to find our encomiaft acknowledging that, through his
hero's toils, we enjoy freedom at laft. Few either of our rhyming or
profeing patriots have the grace to confess so much.

S 2

Though

1

Though profufe in the praifes of Mr. Wilkes, our poet has, with fingular modefty, devoted only one folitary line to his own. After repeated fummons of Procul effe profani! addreffed to the great vulgar,' the ministerial lordlings,' he reiterates the injunction, and thas chately and concifely fpeaks of himself:

Fly!-nor the vengeance of my fury truft,

The man who writes is honeft, brave, and just.

We fhall take leave of our fai-difant brave, juft, and honeft poet, with the lines immediately following the felf-approving couplet; which will furnifh a not unfavourable fpecimen of his fatiric talents: No birth-day Whitehead here fhall tire the ear, Or make the reader curfe the new-born year:

No penfion'd Johnfon's profituted pen

Shall varnish crimes, and praife the worft of men :
No foftly-warbling, fweetly-penfive Gray,
Attempting Ode, fhall blunder in his way,
Miftake his talent, fee his laurels fade
In madrigals of praise to villains paid.

We cannot queftion an unknown gentleman's bravery; but we may be allowed to doubt of his juftice, or at least of his difcernment, and of the decency of the latter part of this quotation. The Inftallation Ode, we apprehend, is here very unjustly or ignorantly claffed with madrigals, and the fubject of it indecently, at leaft, ranked with villains. B--Y

Art. 17. The Exhibition in Hell; or, Moloch turned Sainter.

4to. 1,s. Organ.

Moloch is the devil of a painter indeed! He has pourtrayed the Carlton-houfe junto (under which denomination certain gentlemen who figure in the political world are generally understood) in the blackest and moft frightful colours.-We can fay nothing in praife of his performance, though honeftly inclined to give the devil his due.

Art. 18. Carmen Arabicum, five verba Doctoris Audeddini Alnafaphi, de Religionis Sonnitica Principiis numero vinɛa; nec non Perficu, nimirum Doctoris, Shaadi Shirazita operis, Pomarium dili initium, ubi de De T. O. M. Edidit ac Latiné vertit J. Uri. 4to: 2 s. Oxford, printed at the Clarendon Prefs. Sold in London by White, &c. 1770.

A new and tolerably corre&t edition of an Arabic and a Perfic poem, with a Latin profe tranflation on the oppofite page. There is nothing either new or curious in the poems themselves. L Art. 19. Poetical Effays, chiefly of a moral Nature. Written at different Periods of Time, by a young Man. Wheble. 1770.

8vo. I s. 6 d.

The Author of thefe pieces appears to be a good kind of young man, who has written fome well-meaning verfes, and gratefully dedicated them to his mother. He alleges, as a reafon for their publication, that he had not hitherto rendered himself useful to fociety. For the credit of these matters we will give him our beft and fincereft advice. We affure him that he will never attain to any merit in poetry;

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