IN ITS RELATIONS WITH CHEMISTRY, PHYSICS, AND METEOROLOGY: OR, CHEMISTRY APPLIED TO AGRICULTURE. BY J. B. BOUSSINGAULT, MEMBER OF THE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE, ETC., ETC. THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE. In the work now published, I present the results of the inquiries in which I have been engaged for many years, and which were undertaken in the hope of throwing light upon various points of practical agriculture. My first idea was, to confine myself to the mere re-impression of the several papers which I had communicated from time to time to different periodicals, with the addition of a quantity of inedited matter which I had by me. But upon more mature consideration, I was led to believe that I should be doing a useful thing did I fill up the numerous gaps which must necessarily occur between papers published isolatedly, at dates more or less remote from one another, and treating of the most dissimilar subjects. I have thus been led, in addition to my own observations, to give those of numerous writers on almost every branch of agricultural science, being only careful to confine myself in each instance to the most authentic practical conclusions; for it is certain, that practical data have the most direct interest for rural economy, both in itself and in its bearings upon the general science of political economy. I have a further reason for the plan which I have adopted, which I am the less disposed to pass by in silence, inasmuch as it may plead in excuse with those who might be disposed to criticize the tone, perhaps somewhat too didactic, of my work. I was invited, in conjunction with several other professors attached to a great educational institution, to give a course embracing my views upon the science of agriculture. I consented to this, and prepared my lectures; but motives, to which I was entirely a stranger, having prevented the project from being carried out, I made up my mind to publish, not the lectures such as I should have |