G33 
 
Bread from Stones 
 
 New and Rational System of Land Fertili- 
 zation and Physical Regeneration. 
 
 Translated from the German, 
 
 Price Twenty-Five Cents, 
 
 PHILADELPHIA, PA. 
 
 A. J. TAFEL, 101 1 Arch Street. 
 
 1894= 
 
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 Copyrighted by 
 
 A J. Tafkl. 
 
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 4*rtlMM4. 
 
 T. B. & H. B. COCHRAN, I'RINTKRS, 
 LANCASTER, PA. 
 
publisher's preface, 
 
 This somewhat informal little book^trans- 
 latecl from the writings of Julius Hensel, 
 and other German writers), is designed to in- 
 troduce to the people of the United States a 
 subject that is of vital importance to every- 
 one, young and old. It is a subject in which 
 all should take an interest, even if it be but 
 a selfish one, for it concerns the health of the 
 human race. Ten years ago Hensel, a 
 thinker and a chemist, tentatively put forth 
 his little work, The 31akrobiotic, and, later, 
 a larger work, Das Leben. At first these at- 
 tracted but little attention, but gradually 
 an increasing number of readers sought 
 those original books and new editions of 
 both were called for. Each work was re- 
 vised, largely rewritten and published in 
 Germany by the publishing house of Boericke 
 & Tafel, Philadelphia, Pa., and at the same 
 time the former was translated into Eng- 
 lish and published. As the titles show the 
 subject treated is a large one — Das Leben, or, 
 Englished, The Life. The part of the sub- 
 
ject that bears on agriculture is the topic of 
 this book. At first it was but theory; but 
 during the past few years the theory has 
 passed into the domain of verified science, 
 not, however, without meeting with much 
 fierce opposition — the same opposition that 
 has greeted every great new truth on its 
 advent. 
 
 For years mankind has tacitly accepted 
 the idea that fertilizing must be done, in 
 plain Anglo-Saxon, with filth — animal, bird 
 or human excrement, rotten bones, sewage, 
 rotten anything, reinforced, to be sure, with 
 such chemical matter as nitre, super-phos- 
 phates, lime, etc. Yet everyone knows that, 
 despite all such matter put on the eartH, the 
 land is slowly but surely losing its fertility ; 
 that insect pests increase, and, what is not 
 so well known, the quality of the earth's pro- 
 ducts is deteriorating. Hensel saw what 
 some day all the world will see, that plants 
 require healthy food in order to flourish as 
 much as man or beast does, and that sewage, 
 etc., was not a healthy food. 
 
 As will be seen in the following pages he 
 goes back to the beginning in his search for 
 plant food and finds it in the primeval 
 rocks. Fed on such food, plants will yield 
 to mankind cereals, tubers and fruits that are 
 
publisher's preface. 5 
 
 healthy, wholesome and life-sustaining; the 
 plants being healthy will escape disease and 
 parasites, and many of the ills of man due 
 to unwholesome food from plants will disap- 
 pear. Is it not sound reason to believe that 
 food-yielding plants grown on pure, uncon- 
 taminated soil will be wholesomer than 
 those grown on soil saturated with sewage 
 and rotting manure from stables? 
 
 This is but a brief outline of the theories 
 propounded by Hensel and put in practice 
 in Germany for the last five or six years 
 with amazing success. Put in practice in 
 this country it will not only free the farmer 
 from a heavy yearly expense for artificial 
 fertilizers but will gradually bring back his 
 exhausted fields to their virgin state and 
 give the public food on which health may be 
 maintained. 
 
 In Germany this has become a " cause" 
 sustained by enthusiastic supporters not 
 only among farmers, horticulturalists, 
 florists and gardeners, but also among 
 clergymen, physicians and public-spirited 
 men. They see in it one of the means by 
 which the human race is to be at least 
 physically regenerated, and a sound body is 
 a proper base for a sound mind. 
 
 The Publisher. 
 
PREFACE, 
 
 WHAT WILL FERTILIZING WITH 
 STONE DUST ACCOMPLISH ? 
 It will: 
 
 1. Turn stones into bread and make bar- 
 ren regions fruitful. 
 
 2. Feed the hungry. 
 
 3. Cause healthy cereals and provender to 
 be harvested and thus prevent epidemics 
 among men and diseases among animals. 
 
 4. Make agriculture again profitable and 
 save great sums of money which are now 
 expended either for fertilizers that in part 
 are injurious and in part useless. 
 
 5. Turn the unemployed to country life 
 by revealing the inexhaustible nutritive 
 forces which, hitherto unrecognized are 
 stored up in the rocks, the air and the 
 water. 
 
 This it will accomplish. 
 
 May this little book be intelligible enough 
 that men, who seem on the point of becom- 
 ing beasts of prey, may cease their war of 
 all against all and instead unite in the com- 
 
8 PREFACE. 
 
 moil conquest of the stones. May mankind, 
 instead of hunting for gold, raciug for 
 fame, or wasting productive forces in useless 
 labors, choose the better part : The peace- 
 able emulation in the discovery and direc- 
 tion of the natural forces for evolving nutri- 
 tive products and the peaceable enjoyment 
 of the fruits which the earth is able to pro- 
 duce in abundance for all. May man use 
 his divine heritage of reason to attain true 
 happiness by discovering the sources whence 
 all earthly blessings flow and thus put an 
 end to self-seeking and greed, to the increas- 
 ing difficulties of making a living, the anxie- 
 ties for the daily bread, to distress and 
 crime — such is the aim of this little work, 
 and in this may God aid us ! 
 
 The Author. 
 Hermsdorf beloiv Kynmt, 
 October 1st, 1893. 
 
THE CAUSE OF THE 
 
 Decadence of Agriculture. 
 
 The yield of the ground is steadily decreas- 
 ing. Everywhere is distress. Our fields do 
 not yield sufficiently abundant crops to com- 
 pete with the cheap lands of the far West. 
 To change this condi-tion is the object of this 
 book. 
 
 It is now 400 years since the second half 
 of the world was discovered, but the whole 
 earth is only now discovered, so far as the 
 knowledge is concerned, of how the inex- 
 haustible treasures may be utilized which 
 are at our disposal in the nourishing forces 
 of the rocks of the mountains. Instead of 
 working this colossal mine men have bought 
 the material for restoring the fertility of the 
 exhausted soil in the form of medicine; i. e., 
 chemical fertilizers. 
 
 For the last fifty years a dogma has crept 
 into agriculture which calls itself "The Law 
 of Minimum," namely: 
 
 "That one of the substances which the 
 plant requires and which is contained in the 
 
10 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 minimum quantity in your fields you must 
 furnish to it in the form of a fertilizer." 
 
 This false precept owes its reception solely 
 to the defective method of chemical investi- 
 gation which prevailed fifty years ago. 
 
 As there was found a considerable quan- 
 tity of phosphoric acid and of potash in the 
 ashes of all seeds, and as these do not exist 
 in the air and must therefore be furnished 
 by the soil, it was very natural that the in- 
 quiry was started, how much of these sub- 
 stances necessary for the raising of plants is 
 still at hand in the soil ? 
 
 While the soil was then investigated and 
 was treated with muriatic acid, in order that 
 the substances contained might be dissolved, 
 there were found only inconsiderable quan- 
 tities of potash and of phosphoric acid in 
 this solution, because the alkalies in the soil 
 which are combined with silicic acid are as 
 little dissolved by muriatic acid as, e. g., 
 powdered glass. In order to be able to de- 
 fine the amount of potash, it is necessary 
 first to drive out the silicic acid by the use 
 of fluoric acid after having converted it into 
 volatile fluoride of silicium ; this method was 
 not used by the former agricultural chemists. 
 As in consequence thereof they overlooked 
 the presence of potash, so also did they fail 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 11 
 
 to notice the phosphoric acid which is com- 
 bined with alumina and iron in the silicates, 
 because when the iron was precipitated from 
 the solution the whole of the alumina and 
 phosphoric acid was precipitated with it ; the 
 further examination of the fluid solution 
 therefore gave a negative result with respect 
 to phosphoric acid, and this is also the case 
 at this day if we work according to the old 
 method. 
 
 The teachers of agriculture therefore au- 
 nounced: 
 
 "Of potash and of phosphoric acid, these 
 most important nutriments of plants, there is 
 only & minimum left in the soil; therefore, 
 we must first of all supply potash and phos- 
 phoric acid to our fields." 
 
 To these two substances nitrogen was also 
 added. Nitrogen in the form of vegetable 
 albumen is on the average contained in such 
 quantities in plants that its weight fre- 
 quently exceeds that of the fixed constitu- 
 ents of the ashes. The following may serve 
 to explain this : The affinity of the earthy 
 substances (lime, magnesia and oxide of iron) 
 and of the fixed alkalies with respect to 
 hydro-carbons is quite limited ; its sphere of 
 operation is limited to eighteen molecules 
 of Irydro-carbons, as may be seen in the 
 
V2 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 soaps, which consist of combinations of 
 potassa or soda with oleic acid (C 18 H 34 2 ) or 
 with stearic acid (C 18 H 36 2 ). Of like affinity 
 with these earths and the fixed alkalies is 
 the volatile alkali Ammonia N.H.H.H. This 
 explains why when there are not sufficient 
 earths carried up in the juice to complete 
 the upbuilding of plants in their stalks and 
 leaves their place is filled by ammonia, 
 which, as before said, is formed from the 
 nitrogen and the watery vapor of the air. 
 The wood in the trunk of trees contains no 
 nitrogen at all, but the leaves of trees con- 
 tain a quantity of nitrogen ; the parenchyma 
 of the leaves condenses it from the air be- 
 cause the sphere of action of the earths, 
 which extends even unto the veins of the 
 leaves, does not reach the parenchyma. 
 
 Now, in view of the great quantity of 
 nitrogen found in the produce of the fields 
 and of which agriculturists presuppose that 
 it is derived through the roots of plants 
 from the earth, they came to the same result 
 as with respect to potash and phosphoric 
 acid; i. e., they found only a vanishing 
 " minimum. " of it in the soil, and therefore 
 they concluded : " Our crops have already 
 consumed all the potash, all the phosphoric 
 acid, and all the nitrogen ; these substances 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 13 
 
 are, therefore, in " minimum " proportions in 
 the soil. If we are not to miserably starve 
 we must bring this minimum in abundance 
 into our fields in the form of manures." 
 
 The result is that the use of Super-Phos- 
 phates, Sulphate of Ammonia, Guano and 
 Chili-nitre has enormously increased, but 
 agriculture has entered into the sign of the 
 cancer (retrogression), for it may easily be 
 seen that if the cost of fertilizers amounts 
 to more than the harvest the farmers must 
 emigrate. 
 
 It took a long while before the teachers of 
 agricultural economy, having the fact 
 pointed out to them by practical farmers 
 who judged with clear eyes and sound reason 
 that crops of peas and beans rich in nitrogen 
 prosper on soil entirely void of nitrogen, 
 at least granted that leguminous plants de- 
 rive their whole supply of nitrogen ex- 
 clusively from the air, which as to full four- 
 fifth consists of nitrogen. It is difficult for 
 them to admit that other plants also do this, 
 because their reputation and their income 
 is mainly derived from the theory of potash, 
 nitrogen and phosphoric acid. They explain 
 this by asserting : 
 
 "There are producers of nitrogen and there 
 consumers of nitrogen.'' 
 
14 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 It is of course true that plants also assimi- 
 late such nitrogen as their roots find in the 
 soil, but that is by no means necessary. The 
 forest trees furnish us with a most convinc- 
 ing proof of this. Birches, beeches and oaks 
 grow to gigantic size on bare rocks of 
 granite and porphyry. To be convinced of 
 this, let anyone ascend the Herd mountains! 
 Now as beech leaves and oak leaves contain 
 one full percent, of their weight of nitrogen, 
 while beech wood and oak wood are devoid of 
 nitrogen, the nitrogen of the leaves has evi- 
 dently been furnished, not by the rock, but 
 by the air. 
 
 It is manifest that if the soil were the 
 proper source of nitrogen the roots being in 
 immediate contact with the soil ought to 
 show at least as much nitrogen as the parts 
 above ground which are surrounded with 
 air ; but, on the contrary, they contain less. 
 
 For example, one pound of potatoes con- 
 tains about 25 grains of nitrogen, but the 
 green potato stems and leaves contain more 
 than 42 grains to the pound, and it is from the 
 plant that the tubers draw their nitrogen and 
 not the reverse ; for the potato herb, which in 
 the beginning was so exuberant in juice, 
 about the time the tubers mature becomes 
 thin, hollow and light, because the juice con- 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 15 
 
 taining the nitrogen descends into the 
 tubers. So also does one pound of the green 
 plant of the carrot contain about 35 grains 
 of nitrogen, but the carrot-roots contain 
 only about 14 grains to the pound. 
 
 We may also mention that just as the 
 nitrogen descends into tubers it also passes 
 up into the seeds, so that cereals show as 
 much as 140 grains of nitrogen to the pound. 
 The green stalk of grains show a similar 
 proportion of nitrogen, while in a pound of 
 straw there are only found 33 to 49 grains of 
 nitrogen. 
 
 That the chemical fertilizers that are still 
 all the fashion are a mere waste may be 
 mathematically demonstrated by taking any 
 example at random. I will choose for this 
 the sugar-beet and the carrot. 
 ■ The sugar-beet according to Wolff's tables 
 shows the following ashes per kilogram 
 (2 1-10 lbs.): 
 
 Potash 3.8 Phosphoric acid . . 0.0 
 
 Soda 0.6 Sulphuric acid . . 0.3 
 
 Lime 0.4 Silicic acid .... 0.2 
 
 Magnesia . . . .0.6 Muriatic acid . . .0.3 
 According to atomic equivalents this 
 would make 142 for phosphoric acid, 80 for 
 sulphuric acid, 60 for silicic acid, 73 for muri- 
 atic acid, 94 for potash, 62 for soda, 56 for 
 lime and 40 for magnesia. 
 
16 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 Now the above 
 0.9 of phosphoric acid would saturate 0.6 potash. 
 0.3 of sulphuric acid " " 0.35 " 
 
 0.2 of silicic acid " " 0.3 " 
 
 0.3 of muriatic acid " " 0.4 " 
 
 Thus all the acids together" " 1.65 " 
 
 There remains, therefore, the following 
 excess of bases: 
 
 Potash 2.15 
 
 Soda 0.6 
 
 Lime 0.4 
 
 Magnesia 0.6 
 
 Or if we count the 0.6 of soda, 0.4 of lime 
 and 0.6 of magnesia equivalent with 1.65 of 
 potash, then the entire quantity of potassa 
 in the sugar-beet, amounting to 3.85, would 
 be at our disposal. This potassa we may 
 consider as combined with carbonic acid in 
 the ashes, while it exists in the sugar-beet 
 in combination with sugar, cellular tissue 
 and albumen. Besides these 3.8 potassa, 
 1.6 of nitrogen, or, in round numbers, 1.9 of 
 ammonia, is to be taken into account as 
 being also an unsaturated basic constituent 
 of the beet-root. From this it proximately 
 follows: That the 3.8 potassa cannot result 
 from the manuring with sulphate of potassa, 
 for else it would need the presence of 3.25 of 
 sulphuric acid, while there is only 0.3 present, 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 17 
 
 nor can the 1.9 of ammonia be due to the 
 sulphate of ammonia, else they would call 
 for 5.0 of sulphuric acid instead of only 0.3. 
 If, therefore, we manure sugar-beets with 
 sulphate of potassa and sulphate of am- 
 monia these substances are to be regarded, 
 as already stated, as largely wasted. As the 
 source of the potash and the soda for the 
 sugar-beets we can only consider the feld-spar, 
 which, thanks to God, is still contained to a 
 certain degree in the soil, while the nitrogen 
 is furnished by the atmosphere. 
 
 The feld-spar in the soil will in the end of 
 course become exhausted, and must then be 
 supplied by manuring with the rock fer- 
 tilizer. 
 
 A computation shows that to supply 0.3 
 sulphuric acid 0.6 gypsum which is combined 
 with water will suffice; thus if the acre of 
 land is to furnish two cwt. of beets it would 
 need among other things only 13J lbs. of 
 gypsum. 
 
 As a parallel we will now consider the 
 carrot. The ashy constituents of one kilo- 
 gramme (2.206 lbs.) are according to Wolff's 
 tables as follows : 
 
 Potash 3.0 Phosphoric acid . 1.1 
 
 Soda 1.7 Sulphuric acid .0.5 
 
 Lime 0.9 Silicic acid . . . O.li 
 
 Magnesia . . . .0.4 Muriatic acid . .0.4 
 2 
 
18 BREAD FROM STOKES. 
 
 A comparison with the sugar-beet roots 
 shows that the carrot contains somewhat 
 less potash and magnesia but somewhat 
 more soda and lime ; besides this, the c%rrot 
 contains about one-third more of phosphoric, 
 sulphuric acid and muriatic acid. These 
 variations seem to be caused by manuring 
 with liquid stable manure ; as to the rest we 
 recognize that for the basic constituents of 
 potassa, soda, lime and magnesia in the 
 carrots the pulverized primary rocks of the 
 soil are the natural source. 
 
 We find that all plants, as also all animal 
 bodies (for these are built up from vegetable 
 substances), after combustion, leave behind 
 ashes which always consist of the same sub- 
 stances, although the proportions of admix- 
 ture vary with the different kinds of plants. 
 We always find in these ashes potash, soda, 
 lime, magnesia, iron and manganese com- 
 bined with carbonic, phosphoric, sulphuric, 
 muriatic, fluoric and silicic acids. These 
 ashy constituents give their form and con- 
 nection to the bodies of plants and animals 
 according to the manner indicated above. 
 
 Now, inasmuch as the plants spring rrom 
 the soil, it is manifest that the enumerated 
 earthy or ashy constituents must be fur- 
 nished by the soil. And, as in the soil these 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 19 
 
 substances are present in combination with 
 silica and alumina, the origin of the soil 
 thence becomes manifest. It has arisen from 
 the disintegrated primary rocks, all of which 
 contain more or less potassa, soda, lime, 
 magnesia, manganese and iron, besides phos- 
 phoric, sulphuric, chlorine, fluorine, silica 
 and alumina. From such earthy material 
 from primary rocks, which have been as- 
 sociated with sediments of gypsum and lime, 
 in combination with water and the atmo- 
 sphere under the influence of the warmth 
 and light of the sun, the plants which 
 nourish man and beast originate. 
 
 Now, as all the enumerated earthy mate- 
 rials with the exception of silica and alu- 
 mina enter into the crops that are taken 
 away from field, it is clear that they must 
 be replaced. If we desire normal and 
 healthy crops, and that men and animals 
 living on them should find in them all 
 that is necessary for their bodily suste- 
 nance (phosphate and fluorate of lime and 
 magnesia for the formation of the bones and 
 teeth, potassa, iron and manganese for the 
 muscles, chloride of sodium for the serum of 
 the blood, sulphur for the albumen of the 
 blood, hydro-carbons for the nerve-fat), it 
 will not suffice to merely restore the potassa. 
 
20 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 phosphoric acid and nitrogen. Other things 
 are imperatively demanded. 
 
 With regard to this I shall adduce one in- 
 structive example : The proprietor of an ex- 
 tensive estate wrote to me that he formerly 
 manured with ammonia, super-phosphate and 
 Chili-nitre, and although there was a steady 
 retrogression in the yields, yet he continued 
 to earn something. Of late, however, when 
 he had passed over to manuring with iron 
 slag and Chili-nitre, with a steady retro- 
 gression, at last neither rye, nor barley, 
 nor oats would prosper, only, strange to say. 
 wheat gave a tolerable yield. How could I 
 explain this to him? To this question I gave 
 the desired answer by pointing to the ashy 
 constituents. The ashes of barley and oats 
 contain five times as much sulphuric acid as 
 wheat. The latter could still find its small 
 requisite of sulphuric acid in the soil, but 
 for oats, barley and rye these feeble remains 
 did not suffice. 
 
 Now as we have seen that the primary 
 rocks in the mountain ranges, porphyry , gran- 
 ite and gneiss, through the mellowing and 
 crumbling influence of thousands of years 
 (for nothing else is meant by "disintegra- 
 tion "), has produced the fertile soil which 
 furnishes us with healthy nourishing plants, 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 21 
 
 it may easily be seen that when such a soil 
 has been almost exhausted of the elements 
 that nourish plants through a cultivation of 
 several hundred of years and a yearly turn- 
 ing over with the plough or the spade, the 
 original natural strength cannot be restored 
 to it by means of medicines and single 
 chemicals, but this can only be effected by 
 supplying new soil out of which nothing has 
 grown, and the strength of which is there- 
 fore intact. 
 
 To gain such new soil we need not wait 
 a thousand years till wintry cold, snow and 
 rain crumble the rocky material and bring 
 it down into the valleys. We have only 
 to put our hands to work, and from the 
 proper rocks obtain the necessary materials 
 to rejuvenate the old and worn out soil and 
 restore it again to virgin fertility. 
 
 HEALTHY AND UNHEALTHY PRODUCE. 
 
 According to the chemical examination of 
 the ashes which remain when plants are in- 
 cinerated the average result shows about as 
 much potash and soda as lime and magnesia : 
 silicic acid somewhat more than one-fifth of 
 the sum of these four bases; chlorine about 
 one-twentieth of the whole; phosphoric acid, 
 
22 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 one-sixth of the whole; but sulphuric acid 
 only one-fourth in weight of the phosphoric 
 acid. 
 
 Now, as granite rocks contain on an aver- 
 age six per cent, of potassa and soda, while 
 their contents of phosphoric acid are more 
 than one per cent., granite by itself will 
 ready fulfill the demands for vegetable 
 growth, as may be confirmed by a report in 
 the papers received while writing this. We 
 read : 
 
 u In Deutrnansdorf, Kreis Loewenberg, in 
 Silesia, were found on the heap of re- 
 fuse from the quarries there stalks of rye 
 with ears containing ninety to one hundred 
 grains." {General Anzeiger fur Schlesien 
 and Posen, October 1, 1893.) 
 
 As to chlorine, this mostly reaches our 
 cultivated plants through manuring with 
 liquid manure containing salt, and has been 
 proved directly injurious to the growth and 
 quality of many plants; in this respect it is 
 sufficient to point to the evil effects of 
 manuring tobacco with liquid manure. 
 Chlorine is not found in wheat, rye, barley 
 and oats, millet and buckwheat, linseed, 
 apples and pears, plums and gooseberries, 
 acorns and chestnuts, nor in the wood of any 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 23 
 
 forest trees. We need, therefore, not con- 
 sider chlorine in fertilizing our fields. 
 
 Now, when I state that the given propor- 
 tions of the ashes have yielded this average 
 in comparing more than eighty analyses of 
 the ashes of the various parts of plants, it 
 need not be concluded from this that any 
 particular plant, or the particular part of a 
 plant, needs a quite definite proportion of 
 ashy constituents; but it is found on the 
 contrary that the earthy constituents of the 
 same kind of plants differ in various ways. 
 This explains why we find the same 
 species of plants to flourish now on cal- 
 careous soil, now on soil formed from 
 granite, gneiss or porphyry, as an exam- 
 ple of which I shall only mention sheep's- 
 yarrow (achillea millefolium). This is 
 effected in great part by the fact that 
 potassa and soda are interchangeable, but 
 these two alkalies may also be replaced in 
 most plants to a considerable part by the 
 alkaline earths, lime and magnesia; but, of 
 course, the nutritive value of the plants and 
 the other qualities cannot then remain the 
 same. Potassa and soda may even be wholly 
 lacking in a plant and they may be entirely 
 replaced by lime and magnesia. As this 
 fact is not as yet found in any book, I can- 
 
24 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 not refuse a challenge as to proof. I name 
 as my witnesses the royal mason, Wimmel, 
 of Berlin, and engineer King, of Landshut. 
 In company with these gentlemen I visited, 
 on June 25th, of this year (1893), the loftily 
 situated marble quarry near Rothenzechau. 
 In the neighborhood of this marble quarry 
 the vegetation is always somewhat behind 
 in time to that of the valley, and so we 
 found the dandelions still wearing their 
 downy crown, while in the valley, by the 
 end of May, they have passed away. We 
 found such dandelions there growing imme- 
 diately on the marble rock, where this had 
 water flowing over it, and the flowerstalks 
 reached the height of about a foot and a half. 
 There was not, indeed, any great wealth of 
 leaves, and the thick and high flowerstalks 
 themselves could be broken like glass into 
 pieces, which I did not weary in repeating 
 before the eyes of my companions. Now 
 this Silesian marble is a very white dolo- 
 mite, consisting, therefore, of carbonate 
 of lime and carbonate of magnesia; but it 
 must also surely contain besides this some 
 phosphate and sulphate of lime besides a 
 trace of carbonate of protoxide of iron the 
 presence of which is demonstrated in the 
 moist clefts of the marble by a brown 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 25 
 
 oxidation. These plants, therefore, grew 
 on a sub-stratnm of almost pure lime 
 and magnesia. This extreme example 
 convinces us that the alkaline earths 
 (lime and magnesia) may really replace 
 the alkalies (potassa and soda) in the 
 building up of plants, aud this also furnishes 
 us with the explanation why the iron- 
 slag, as a pre-eminently calcareous fertilizer, 
 unmistakably caused an increase of crops 
 on fields which were deficient in lime. The 
 same result might, indeed, have been reached 
 more cheaply by directly spreading the lime 
 on them. But there is another "But" in 
 this matter, for in harvests it is not merely 
 the quantity but much more the quality 
 which has to be considered. 
 
 Even if the striking example cited makes 
 it manifest that lime may in great part re- 
 place the alkalies in building up plants, 
 giving to them the same form, and, indeed, 
 making them of imposing size, nevertheless 
 the quality and the internal worth of the prod- 
 ucts of the soil is considerably influenced 
 by the difference in its basic constituents. 
 I, therefore, mentioned, not unintentionally, 
 that the flower stalks of the dandelion grown 
 on marble could be broken like glass into 
 separate pieces, while on the contrary dande- 
 
26 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 lion stalks growing on soil containing potassa 
 may be bent into rings and formed into 
 chains, as is frequently done by children. 
 Potassa makes pliable and soft, lime makes 
 hard and brittle. Flax is a very good ex- 
 ample of this. 
 
 Silesian linen made of the flax growing on 
 our granite soil rich in potassa is celebrated 
 for its suppleness, softness and durability, 
 while the Spanish and French linen pro- 
 duced on calcareous soils is hard, of little 
 strength of fibre and of small value. What 
 avails it then that the Spanish flax exceeds 
 the Silesian by twice its length? 
 
 As with textile plants so with plants serv- 
 ing for nourishment and for fodder. It is 
 manifest that where calcareous plants have 
 not the same nutritive value as those in 
 which alkalies and earth are harmoniously 
 associated that the former are not as 
 healthy as the latter. With reference to 
 this, Dr. Stamm, who practiced in Zurich, 
 (where in 1884 I saw a whole mountain of 
 lime dug away), states that he nowhere saw 
 so many examples of ossification of the 
 arteries as on the Swiss soil so rich in lime; 
 the fact that the drinking water is corre- 
 spondingly rich in lime may contribute to it. 
 The strong, bony frame of the Swiss strikes 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 27 
 
 every one, even those travelers who visit 
 Switzerland only for a short trip. This was 
 an essential reason why Winkelried in 1386 
 at Sempach could with his strong-boned 
 arms hold a whole dozen of lances of the 
 knights, and 1400 Swiss could win the victory 
 over 6000 Austrians who were fed on meat, 
 wine and flour, and this despite of their 
 4000 horsemen in armor. 
 
 How much influence nutrition exercises on 
 temperament and breed may be seen from 
 the breeders of fine horses. As Prof. Mar- 
 ossy communicated to me, Englishmen im- 
 port the oats for their race horses from 
 Hungary. Why? Because the granite of 
 the Carpathian mountains is rich in potassa, 
 but contains but little lime. Potassa makes 
 supple, but lime makes tough and awkward. 
 The counterpart of the world-renowned 
 Hungarian saddle horses and carriage horses 
 is found in the strong-boned Norman breed 
 horse which derives its peculiarities from the 
 French chalky soil, and could not be easily 
 replaced as draught animals before the 
 heavy stone wagons, the baggage wagons 
 and the brewers' wagons with their heavy 
 loads of beer barrels. 
 
 And is it possible that the human race 
 should be uninfluenced by its nutrition 
 
 9 
 
28 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 Let us make some comparisons: Wine con- 
 tains almost only phosphate of potassa, for 
 the calcareous ingredients are precipitated 
 during the fermentation as tartar. Hence 
 the French esprit, the Austrian good nature, 
 the artistic inspiration of the wine-drinking 
 Italians. But like a stone wall in the battle 
 stand the Pommeranian potato-eating grena- 
 diers. In the ashes remaining from potatoes 
 we find the following proportions : 44 potassa, 
 4 soda, 64 lime, 33 magnesia, 16 phosphoric 
 acid and 13 sulphuric acid. Sulphur is in- 
 dispensable in the formation of normal bile 
 and of tendons. Also hair and wool require 
 much sulphur, about 5 per cent, of their 
 weight. 
 
 After some such hints as to nutrition it 
 cannot be indifferent what kind of crops we 
 raise for our nourishment and with what 
 substances our fields are fertilized. It can- 
 not be all sufficient that great quantities are 
 harvested, but the great quantity must also 
 be of good quality. It is indisputable that 
 by merely fertilizing with marl; i. e., with 
 carbonate of lime, such a large yield may be 
 gained as to make a man inclined to always 
 content himself with marl, but with such a 
 one-sided fertilization slowly but surely evil 
 effects of various kinds will develop; these 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 29 
 
 have given rise to the axiom of experience : 
 " Manuring with lime makes rich fathers 
 but poor sons/' 
 
 Despite such experience, however, after a 
 certain time, when those who experienced 
 the damage have passed away, manuring 
 with lime always again becomes a fashon. 
 So even now. The harvests after manuring 
 with lime are so favorable that there are 
 those who expect their salvation from fertil- 
 izing with lime. Not loug ago the German 
 Agricultural Society granted a prize to a 
 paper on " Fertilizing with Lime." But such 
 prizes do not prove anything. Also a paper 
 on Chili-nitre as a fertilizer received a prize. 
 But how has this substance, so poisonous for 
 plants and animals, fallen into disgrace ! 
 
 Lime, indeed, is not directly injurious to 
 plant growth, on the contrary it is useful 
 and necessary, but everything has its measure 
 and its limits. Lime can only produce whole- 
 some cereals, vegetables and forage when 
 there is at the same time a sufficiency of 
 potassa and soda. 
 
 " Too much of a thing is good for nothing I" 
 In this connection I have to add a few things 
 more. In the same way as lime and mag- 
 nesia can replace potassa and soda in the 
 structure of plants so all these four constitu- 
 
30 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 ents can in great part be replaced by basic 
 Ammonia, without any resultant appreciable 
 change in the form of the plants', except that 
 this appears strikingly luxuriant and rich in 
 leaves, as the milfoil on and near the mounds 
 of cemeteries. 
 
 Such a substitution of ammonia for the 
 alkalies and the alkaline earths corresponds 
 in some degree to the relation between 
 potassa-alum and ammonia-alum, which are 
 so similar in form that they cannot be dis- 
 tinguished without a chemical examination. 
 In an analogous manner the muriate of 
 ammonia has quite a similar taste to the 
 muriate of soda, and the sulphate of ammo- 
 nia almost the same bitter taste as sulphate 
 of soda (Glauber's salt) and sulphate of mag- 
 nesia (Epsom salts), but the effects of these 
 salts vary considerably. 
 
 A particularly interesting example of the 
 fact that the appearance of plants in which 
 ammonia has largely taken the place of the 
 fixed alkalies and earths is found in tobacco 
 leaves. Only specialists can at/ once recog- 
 nize their quality at a glance ; the great 
 majority only perceive the difference when 
 the leaves, made into cigars, are lighted. 
 Then the one kind, grown on the Virginia 
 soil, rich in magnesia and lime, gives us 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 31 
 
 light, loose ashes and a fine aroma, while 
 the product of Vierraden (Prussia), manured 
 with stable dung and liquid manure, in 
 which ammonia takes the place of lime and 
 magnesia, " coals," and diffuses an unpleas- 
 ant odor. It is quite similar with plants 
 raised for nourishment or for fodder. The 
 inability of offering resistance, as seen in 
 the " lodging " of grain after manuring with 
 dung and liquid manure, after a long rain, 
 and, in accordance with this, the grain also 
 which is harvested from such a field has no 
 firmness ; it becomes soft in grinding, smear- 
 ing the mill-stones, so that no grain raised 
 with stable manure can be ground without 
 mixing it with Western or California grain, 
 and it has always a lesser value. So the 
 barley raised with stable manure produces a 
 malt which the brewer refuses to buy, as it 
 would spoil his beer. 
 
 Now, as these ammonical plants lack the 
 internal firmness and the ability of offering 
 resistance, so also they cannot be healthy 
 for animals when used as fodder, for the 
 animal bodies have no consistence without 
 earths. But these earths are subject to 
 elimination owing to respiration. The ashy 
 constituents of the blood-disks, which are 
 oxidized by respiration ; i. \e., sulphate and 
 
32 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 phosphate of lime, magnesia and iron, are 
 eliminated from the organism with the 
 secretion of the kidneys, as also the bases 
 present in the flesh of the muscles ; i. e., 
 potassa and soda ; for the muscular sub- 
 stance also is oxidized through the oxygen 
 of the arterial blood. 
 
 Now, as the earthy or ashy constituents, 
 which are specifically necessary for the 
 albumen of the blood, as well as for the 
 flesh of the muscles and for the renewal of 
 the bones (for all parts of the body are sub- 
 ject to this mutation of substance), are not 
 replaced by the substances in the fodder, it 
 is an unavoidable sequence that a relaxation 
 and loosening of the tissues, brittleness of 
 the bones and every kind of disturbance of 
 health should take place with our cattle. I 
 shall only adduce one single very instructive 
 example in proof of this out of my neighbor- 
 hood. 
 
 The hotel keeper in Carlsthal, near 
 Schreiberhau, in the Riesengebirge, kept 
 twelve beeves. The manure from the cattle 
 he conveyed to a swampy meadow, which 
 up to that time had only produced sour 
 grasses ; but after the stable manure was 
 applied it yielded so luxurious a growth of 
 grass that he used the abundance to feed his 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 33 
 
 twelve oxen and cows. It was not long, 
 however, before the cattle became decrepid 
 and ten of them died. The cause of this 
 was the fodder grown from stable manure, 
 in which ammonia supplied the place of the 
 fixed alkalies, potassa, soda, lime and mag- 
 nesia. The other two beeves were quickly 
 sold, for they suffered from lickerishness ; 
 i. p., they refused their food and gnawed 
 instead the cribs and other wood in the 
 stable. For all wood contains about three 
 per cent, of earthy substance, and the cattle 
 craved these earthy substances in order to 
 gain firm flesh and bones. The tw T o oxen 
 recovered when their new owner gave them 
 a different fodder. 
 
 This same reason serves to explain other 
 cases lately observed. It has been found 
 that some kinds of pork do not bear pick- 
 ling. While salt and nitrate of potash in- 
 sure the keeping of pickled meat, the meat 
 of certain hogs when lying in brine very 
 soon passes into putrefaction, but into a 
 decomposition different from the usual kind. 
 The process that takes place is like what is 
 called the "cheesy degeneration," which 
 chemically means that the connective and 
 muscular tissues decompose into peptones 
 (Leucin and Tja-osin) as during digestion. 
 
34 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 To explain this phenomenon we must con- 
 sider the cheesy degeneration of the lung- 
 tissue in consumptives. In their blood there 
 is also always a deficit in lime and sulphur, 
 which are absolutely necessary in the forma- 
 tion of red blood-disks. 
 
 Now, on inquiring why this pork when 
 pickled underwent such a peculiar change, 
 it was found that the animals had been fat- 
 tened with Fray Bentos Meat Powder. But 
 the lean meat contains as its chief ashy 
 constituent only phosphate of potassa with 
 almost imperceptible traces of lime and 
 sulphur. Lime, indeed, is not found in the 
 meat but in the bones, which are devoured 
 by the tiger and the dog, but not by man. 
 Therefore we have to gain the calcareous 
 supply for our blood, our bones and our 
 teeth from calcareous corn and from vege- 
 tables rich in lime. As our present fine 
 flour, freed from bran, is furnished us almost 
 entirely devoid of sulphur and lime we 
 need not wonder at the great number of 
 modern maladies. 
 
 Now when hogs are fed with Fray Bentos 
 Meat Powder, devoid of lime in place of 
 vegetable food, rich in lime, they cannot 
 acquire a strong bony frame, and in con- 
 sequence we need not wonder at the flac S^ 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 35 
 
 ity, sponginess and easy putrefaction of the 
 meat of such animals. If they had not been 
 slaughtered in good time these helpless 
 animals likely would have succumbed to 
 some hog disease. 
 
 From this we may draw our conclusions 
 with respect to human health. Many a one 
 considers a meat diet to be a godsend, but is 
 plagued on that account with rheumatism, 
 asthma and corpulency, to cure which he is 
 ordered to drink some mineral waters which 
 contain lime, magnesia and sulphate of soda. 
 
 To return to agriculture and the feeding 
 of cattle. Nitrogenous foods are supposed 
 to be strength-givers; this is a theoretic 
 error full of fatal consequences for agricult- 
 ure. We never have had as many cattle 
 plagues as we have had since artificial fer- 
 tilizers and " strong" foods have been in 
 vogue. 
 
 The theorists in nutrition who demand 
 that man should have so much of hydro- 
 carbon, so much fat and so much albumen 
 have evidently little conception of the close 
 relationship in which these substances stand 
 to one another, by which the one may pass 
 over into the other'; e. g., the hydro-carbon 
 sugar through the adjunction of earths and 
 ammonia becomes albumen. But albumen 
 
36 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 easily undergoes a change into fat, as may 
 be seen in cheese, and also from the manner 
 in which the meat of the ham passes into 
 fat. The same transformation takes place 
 in nutriments containing hydro-carbons; e. g., 
 the malt sugar of beer drinkers and the 
 starch of grasses. Many an ox accumulates 
 a few hundred points of tallow and yet is 
 not fed with fat or butter, but with grass, 
 hay and grain. 
 
 The so-called "strong" food of cattle, 
 therefore, amounts to nothing and ought 
 rather to be called poison-food. The truly 
 strong food for cattle consists of mountain 
 herbs, rich in earth, when these besides 
 alkalies also contain lime and magnesia. 
 Just think of the dairy cows of the Swiss 
 Alps and of the cattle in Holstein that 
 derive their strength from the grass of the 
 marshes which are not fertilized with stable 
 manure, but which are preserved in their 
 lasting fertility by the neighboring rocky 
 highlands, which continually enables the 
 rain to wash down the soluble rocky ma- 
 terial which enriches the meadows. 
 
 As a counterpart to the pork raised from 
 Fray Bentos Meat Flour I will mention here 
 an example from my own observation. Here 
 (on the Kynast) I kept two sheep. I once 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 37 
 
 saw them eating lime from the wall of the 
 stable, as chickens do when they need lime 
 for their egg-shells. From this I concluded 
 that the grasses growing on my soil, in 
 which there is little lime, did not supply 
 them with sufficient sustenance for their 
 bones. I, therefore, mixed some whiting 
 with their cooked roots and this craving for 
 lime ceased. When I at last sold the animals 
 to the butcher he was so much pleased at 
 their solid meat that he desired to bespeak 
 immediately some sheep for the next year. 
 
 I would here mention that the sheep- 
 raiser, Mr. von Wiedebach, in Guben, in- 
 quired of me whether the principles of my 
 " Makrobiotik" were not applicable to cattle- 
 raising, especially so as to put an end to the 
 mortality among sheep and to the mouth- 
 disease and the foot-rot; I advised him to give 
 in certain proportion precipitated chalk or 
 whiting, flowers of sulphur and copperas, as 
 a periodical addition to their food ; and he 
 has repeatedly assured me that by these 
 means he has in very many places, whither 
 he has been called as a specialist, put an end 
 to the mortality of the cattle, and has 
 brought them in other places to a normal 
 state of health. 
 
 Chemistry teaches us that the character- 
 
38 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 istic nature of the albumen rich in ammonia 
 consists in the easy interchangeableness of 
 their atomic groups; but just on this ac- 
 count muscular fibre and connective tissue 
 can be built up from the albumen of the 
 blood, but every case has two sides. The 
 ease with which the constituents of albumen 
 can be shifted also favors their chemical de- 
 composition. Need I mention here the 
 savory taste of fresh-laid eggs and the smell 
 of rotten ones? Intelligent people have 
 long since perceived that feeding with albu- 
 men does not do all that the theorists claim. 
 It does no pay for its expenses. 
 
 The chemical " strong" food for the soil in 
 shape of the Chili-nitre, which contains 
 nitrogen, and has been awarded the premium 
 over all its competitors, has proved a miser- 
 able failure; but the theorists are inde- 
 fatigable. They now advocate chemical 
 " strong" food for cattle, and there are many 
 people who put these latest theory into dis- 
 astrous practice. 
 
 All of us have to bear the evil conse- 
 quences of this. Does not stable-feeding 
 cohere with this "strong" feeding and this 
 forced fattening? And does not the stable 
 air so poor in oxygen cause the murraiD of 
 cattle? And does not the mortality of our 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 39 
 
 children spring from the cow-milk poor in 
 earths? That in consequence of fertilizing 
 with stable manure crops poor in earths are 
 produced is indubitable after what has been 
 stated above. From these nutriments poor 
 in earths again follows a host of ills — nervous 
 debility, nervous sufferings, decomposition 
 of lymph and serum, which are continually 
 becoming more prevalent. Among these 
 diseases are anaemia, chlorosis, scrofula, 
 swelling of the lymphatic glands, cutaneous 
 diseases, asthma, catarrhal states, nervous- 
 ness, epilepsy, gout, rheumatism, corpulency, 
 dropsy, consumption, diabetes, etc., as I have 
 demonstrated anatomically and physiologi- 
 cally in a manner easily comprehended in 
 the book "Makrobiotik" or " Our Diseases 
 and Our Remedies." Fertilizing with stone- 
 meal will in future give us normal and 
 healthy crops and fodder. 
 
 WHAT SHALL WE DO WITH STABLE 
 MANURE? 
 
 So long as attention was not called to the 
 fact that new earth from pulverized primi- 
 tive rock, together with the carbonate and 
 the sulphate of lime, forms the best and most 
 natural fertilizer for an exhausted soil, men 
 directed their attention to that part of the 
 
40 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 food which cattle do not assimilate, but ex- 
 crete, for manure. So men came pretty gen- 
 erally to the position that we must bring 
 dung to an exhausted field, else nothing can 
 grow. Now in order to get manure we 
 must raise cattle; for these stables and at- 
 tendants are necessary, and a considerable 
 area of land must be devoted to provide the 
 necessary fodder. Now since it is said that 
 without manure nothing can grow, manure 
 must be used to make fodder grow on which 
 cattle feed in order to produce manure for 
 more fodder. In such a circle of life where 
 does the advantage of keeping cattle come 
 in? The raising of cattle only pays in 
 mountainous regions, where the fructifying 
 dew transforms the stones into herbs, or in 
 the marshes irrigated by canals, for here the 
 subsoil is naturally moist, and without 
 water nothing can grow. In marshy regions 
 the raiser of cattle can put his hands in his 
 pockets and look on while the ox "eats 
 money into his pocket;" but elsewhere the 
 ox rather eats money out of the owner's 
 pockets than into them. 
 
 But anyways the production of milk, 
 butter, cheese and wool, as well as the neces- 
 sity of having horses for driving, makes the 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 41 
 
 raising of cattle and horses a factor that 
 must be taken into consideration. 
 
 Now as all cattle produce manure, solid 
 and liquid, the question arises: " What shall 
 we do with it?" 
 
 The fact that stable manure undoubtedly 
 promotes the growth of plants gives to it a 
 certain value. This value does not depend 
 upon the nitrogen but on the earthy or ashy 
 constituents which it contains, and on the 
 combinations of hydro-carbons; i. e., these 
 carbonate carbohydrates do not need to be 
 first produced by the sun, but may be util- 
 ized by a simple change of grouping and 
 may be compared to ready-made building 
 stone that may at once be built into the 
 plants with this result that their growth 
 may take place in the cool springtime more 
 quickly than where the warm sun must do 
 the whole work of drawing the carbon out 
 of the carbonate rocks in conjunction with 
 water. Still this advantage will no more be 
 considered so decisive because the same re- 
 sult, yea, a result almost four times as great 
 according to my experience, may be attained 
 by a judicious mixture of rocks in a finely 
 powdered state. This stone-meal is dry 
 while manure is moist, and for that reason 
 the former is worth at least four times as 
 
42 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 much because more condensed, while in ad- 
 dition thereto the earthy constituents have 
 mostly been eliminated out of the latter by 
 passing through the animal or human body, 
 and the stone-meal mixture contains these 
 in abundance. But of course not all earthy 
 constituents have been taken out of the 
 dung, for of some a superabundance may 
 have been provided, part of which is still 
 contained therein. 
 
 Such manure, therefore, is by no means 
 without value; as animal bodies contain 
 about % of water so there are also consider- 
 able quantities of water contained in crops. 
 Dry hay, e. g., will in the kiln still lose 15 per 
 cent, of water ; and green fodder and vege- 
 tables contain a full f or f of water; in some 
 root crops the water amounts even to nine- 
 tenths. Considering its properties of water 
 stable manure is not to be valued so highly, 
 because only an equal weight of crops can 
 be procured therefrom. Still even this is 
 sufficient to keep us from rejecting it. Only 
 it should be deprived of the injurious quali- 
 ties clinging to it owing to its excessive 
 quantity of nitrogen. As far as the liquid 
 manure is concerned, indeed, little damage 
 is done, for despite those erudite in manures 
 the simple farmer spreads the liquid manure 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 43 
 
 over the fields, Avhere the ammonia K 2 H 6 is 
 oxidized into nitrogen K 2 and water H 6 3 . 
 Before this process is completed, or at least 
 before the ammonia has been very much 
 diluted, as on the irrigated fields, nothing 
 will grow from it. The most important 
 point lies in this, that it is not the nitrogen 
 which is combined organically with hydro- 
 carbons as in leucin, ty rosin and hippurate 
 of lime which is the most inj urious factor of 
 the dung, but the carbonate of ammonia, 
 which is formed from the urea of the liquid 
 manure. Free ammonia is a poison to plants. 
 Ammonia is not only poisonous for plant- 
 roots, but is also poisonous for animals, 
 producing paralysis, even when diluted in 
 the blood to a mere trace. In this respect 
 I shall report a case from actual life respect- 
 ing stable manure; wherever a similar state 
 prevails a lesson may be drawn from what 
 I report. 
 
 In certain cavalry barracks there was a 
 rule that in summer the bedding from the 
 horse stables should be spread in the morn- 
 ing on the open place before the stables to 
 dry, and then be used again in the evening. 
 In the stables of these barracks a remark- 
 able mortality of horses developed, and what 
 was the cause ? The liquid manure in the 
 
44 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 straw became more and more concentrated, 
 and carbonate of ammonia in excessive quan- 
 tity was thence generated, because urea in 
 a moist state is transformed into this sub- 
 stance. 
 
 (UreaCO HHN plusO H =COo| HHHNie A 
 HUN H HHHN 
 
 Ammonia.) 
 
 Such ammonical vapors are indeed per- 
 ceptible in every horse stable, but in those 
 military stables this evil was extreme. In 
 stepping near the cribs, the rising ammonia 
 vapors irritating the mouth and nostrils 
 caused catarrh, and the eyes would gather 
 tears. Now the heads of the horses were 
 bent down over the cribs, they continually 
 inhaled concentrated fumes of ammonia. 
 This acted in a paralyzing manner on the 
 nervus vagus and its branches in the re- 
 spiratory organs and in the abdominal 
 system. The horses were seized with fever, 
 stopped eating and died. The veterinary 
 physician did not recognize the carbonate 
 of ammonia as the real cause of the appall- 
 ing numbers of cases of disease and death, 
 but according to his dictum the stables were 
 infected with Bacilli. A thorough disinfec- 
 tion with carbolic acid was therefore ordered. 
 For this purpose, of course, the bedding also 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 45 
 
 with aU its "bacilli" was ordered out and 
 the learned veterinary physician gained a 
 brilliant scientific victory, for after throwing 
 out and burning the bedding and whitewash- 
 ing the walls the mortality ceased for the 
 time being. 
 
 In my book, " Das Leben" I have recom- 
 mended the transformation of the carbonate 
 of ammonia which comes from the liquid 
 manure into odorless sulphate of ammonia 
 and carbonate of lime by strewing the 
 stables with gypsum. Thereby the solid 
 and the liquid manure are freed from their 
 injurious qualities, which are manifested 
 wherever the manure is heaped up a foot 
 deep before it is removed and fresh bedding 
 substituted for it. Those who have hitherto 
 given no heed to the warning fumes of car- 
 bonate of ammonia and its evil conse- 
 quences may continue to consult the 
 veterinarians how to put a stop to the 
 prevelance of cattle diseases. 
 
 We have already shown how the car- 
 bonate of ammonia may be rendered harm- 
 less. Now, in order to largely increase the 
 value of the manure, the primitive rocks 
 containing potassa and soda, reduced to 
 powder, should be scattered over the fields 
 before the manure is spread. Thereby the 
 
46 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 nitrogenous hydro-carbons of the solid and 
 liquid stable manure are prevented from 
 entering into a decomposing fermentation, 
 which give rise to unwholesome ammoniacal 
 products of decomposition, which in part 
 through capillarity rise into the plants with- 
 out being transformed into vegetable sub- 
 stance; such plants when cooked manifest 
 an ill odor, as may be seen in vegetables 
 raised on fields irrigated with sewerage. Of 
 late even roses are said to be cultivated on 
 such irrigated fields near Berlin, but the 
 home of the Bulgarian rose, that yields the 
 attar of roses, lies at the foot of the Balkan 
 mountains, which consist of granite, gneiss 
 and porphyry ; i. e., the rose demands a soil 
 of disintegrated primitive rocks, or with us 
 it demands as a fertilizer pulverized rocks. 
 All roses fertilized with sewerage are in- 
 fested with leaf-lice. Whoever undertakes 
 rose culture on such fields need not expect 
 success. 
 
 In order to lay down once more the value 
 of stable manure, and of excrementitious 
 matter in general, it is demonstrable that 
 nitrogenous ammonia is injurious. What is 
 effective consists of the combustible hydro- 
 carbons, which are ready building material, 
 and further of the earthy or ashy constituents 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 47 
 
 to which the hydro-carbons cling ; for the 
 hydro-carbons by themselves are rather 
 injurious than useful to the growth of 
 plants. This may be seen when we pour 
 petroleum on the soil of potted plants, but 
 hydro-carbons combined with bases and soluble 
 in water advance the formation of leaves. I 
 summarize then as follows : 
 
 1. Nitrogen in the* form of carbonate of 
 ammonia is directly injurious to the growth 
 of plants. 
 
 2. Nitrogen is unnecessary as a fertilizer 
 for the growth of plants if the soil contains 
 a sufficiency of fixed basic substances (alka- 
 lies and alkaline earths). The proof of this 
 is afforded by the fruitful calcareous soil of 
 the Jura, which is not manured with nitro- 
 gen, so also the illimitable pasture grounds 
 in America as also the vegetation of our 
 German mountains. If plants find at their 
 disposal for their growth a sufficiency of 
 fixed bases they receive an ample supply of 
 the complementary nitrogen from the air. 
 four-fifths of which consists of nitrogen. 
 
 3. The nitrogen of the solid and the liquid 
 manure may be used in the construction of 
 plants, but in order to produce crops useful 
 to health it is necessary to add to it a suffi- 
 cient quantity of alkalies and of alkaline 
 
48 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 earths in the form of stone-meal as a coun- 
 terpoise. By so doing we not only preserve, 
 but especially amend, the nature of stable 
 manure. 
 
 WILL FERTILIZING WITH STONE-MEAL 
 PAY? 
 
 Some people say : " With such nonsense 
 as Hensel's l stone-meal ' I shall never have 
 anything to do ; nothing can grow from it." 
 " Useless dirt." This is the cry of men who 
 have no chemical knowledge, yet two hun- 
 dred farmers in the Palatinate testified 
 before court that fertilizing with stone-meal 
 showed far better effects than those from 
 the artificial manures used hitherto. 
 
 u What do you say to this?" asked the 
 judge of the young man who had declared 
 the stone-meal a swindle (being himself a 
 dealer in artificial manures). " I don't say 
 anything to it ; the people deceive them- 
 selves," replied the young man, who was 
 fined for a too libelous tongue. 
 
 Since then persons who traffic in artificial 
 manures are good enough to allow : " We 
 will not deny that Hensel's stone-meal may 
 have a certain effect, but this is far too 
 slow and too small; for the silicate bases are 
 almost quite insoluble and it will have to 
 
BREAD FROM STONES.. 49 
 
 disintegrate for many years. These people 
 also are deficient in chemical knowledge. 
 
 The silicates have indeed little solubility 
 in water and hydrochloric acid, but they do 
 not resist water and the forces of the sun. 
 
 Of course, in speaking of the solubility of 
 silicic acid we must not compare this with 
 the solubility of common salt or sugar. 
 Lime would sooner do for comparison, for 
 of this one part dissolves in 800 parts of 
 water. Silicic acid is somewhat less soluble, 
 for little more than one-half of a grain is 
 dissolved in 1000 grains of water. All hot 
 springs contain silicic acid in solution to- 
 gether with other substances from the primi- 
 tive rocks. 
 
 Men who say that silicates of bases are 
 insoluble are contradicted by the trees of 
 the forest as well as by every single straw. 
 Oak leaves, on combustion, leave 4f per 
 cent, of ashes, and of these fully one-third 
 consists of silicic acid. How can this come 
 into the leaves unless the ascending sap con- 
 veyed it in solution? 
 
 The accumulation of the silicic acid in the 
 leaves is the result of the evaporation of the 
 water which conveyed it. 
 
 From the forest tree to the straw! In the 
 ashes of the straw of winter wheat, two- 
 
50 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 thirds consist of silicic acid. In the beard 
 of the barley the proportion is still greater. 
 This yields nearly 12 per cent, of ashes, and 
 8J of this consists of silicic acid. 
 
 Still more striking is the solubility of 
 silicic acid in the stems and leaves of plants 
 which grow in water or in wet soil. Reeds, 
 e. g., on combustion, leave 3^ per cent, of 
 ashes, more than two-thirds of which is 
 silicic acid. 
 
 Sedge or reed-grass yields 6 per cent, of 
 ashes, of which one-third is silicic acid. 
 That sedge is at the same time rich in 
 potassa proves in the most striking manner 
 that it needs only irrigation to make sili- 
 cate of potassa available for plant growth. 
 Shave-grass (Horse-tail) leaves 20 per cent, 
 of ashes, half of which consist of silicic acid. 
 From this it may be seen that only in those 
 parts of plants which rise above the water, 
 so that evaporation can take place, silicic 
 acid is accumulated. But in the water itself 
 this very solubility of silicic acid stands in 
 the way of its accumulation. The best 
 proof of this we find in seaweed. This leaves 
 behind it a greater proportion of ashes than 
 most plants, namely, up to 14f per cent., but 
 only one-fiftieth of this is silicic acid. The 
 remainder mainly consists of sulphate and 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 51 
 
 muriate of potassa, soda, lime and magnesia; 
 these the seaweed concentrates and combines 
 with its cellular tissue, for sea water has not 
 14§ per cent, but only about 4 per cent, of 
 saline constituents. 
 
 This is sufficient to prove that with re- 
 spect to vegetation silicic acid and silicates 
 are not insoluble ; on the contrary, they 
 enter, like all other saline combinations, 
 into the most intimate combination with 
 glycolic acid, C O O C H H, which is in- 
 tramolecularly present in the cellulose of 
 plants, so also with the ammonia of the 
 chlorophyl so that the silicates cohere with 
 the plants growing from them as an organic 
 whole. We may easily convince ourselves 
 of this on tearing a weed out by its roots. 
 Then it is seen that the root-fibres of most 
 of the plants are everywhere entwined 
 around little stones which, dangling, still 
 cleave to them and can only be torn away 
 from them by violence and by tearing off 
 some of the fibres. 
 
 So the objection as to the insolubilit}^ of 
 silicic acid is invalid both theoretically and 
 practically. 
 
 In reality we cannot find a root, a stem, a 
 leaf or a fruit which does not contain silicic 
 acid. This fact must be known to every 
 
52 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 teacher of agriculture. How then can these 
 teachers deny the solubility of salicic acid 
 in vegetation, as many of them who advo- 
 cate artificial fertilizers do? 
 
 The men interested in artificial manures 
 who thought that they had attended the 
 funeral of stone-meal as a fertilizer have 
 learned nothing from history, or have at 
 least forgotten that every new truth has first 
 to be killed and buried before it can cele- 
 brate its resurrection. Besides I do not 
 stand as isolated as these people suppose, 
 for I have the light of truth and of knowl- 
 edge on my side — 
 
 He who tights for truth and right 
 E'en alone, has strength and might. 
 
 I can also call to my aid a whole army of 
 men who understand something of chemistry 
 and of scientific farming, and their number, 
 at this day where science is making such 
 giant strides and hundreds of well edited 
 agricultural papers are ready to support the 
 interests of the farmer, is daily on the in- 
 crease. 
 
 What is lacking at present is that the 
 manufacture of stone-meal should be under- 
 taken by men of scientific attainments who 
 at the same time have sterling honesty, so 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 53 
 
 as to make it certain that farmers will 
 actually receive what is promised and what 
 has proved itself so useful hitherto. I have 
 received innumerable requests from farmers 
 who asked for this mineral manure, but I 
 had to answer them that with my advanced 
 years I could not actively engage in this 
 manufacture. The whole subject is of such 
 immense importance for the common wel- 
 fare that it is my wish to see this work 
 placed into hands that are thoroughly reliable. 
 I but point the way for the benefit of the 
 human race.* 
 
 The practical point to settle is how far 
 fertilizing with stone meal pays, what 
 yield it will afford, thus whether it will be 
 profitable for the farmer to use it. I shall 
 therefore treat this subject as exhaustively 
 as possible and give an exact account of the 
 results obtained. 
 
 It must here be premised that the fineness 
 of the stamping or grinding and the most com- 
 plete intermixture of the constituent parts 
 are of the greatest importance for securing 
 the greatest benefit of stone-meal fertilizing. 
 A manufactured article of this kind has 
 
 *Mr. A. J. Tafel, of 1011 Arch St., Philadelphia, 
 Pa., can give any inquirer further information on 
 the subject of Hensel's discoveries. 
 
54 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 recently been submitted to me which showed 
 in a sieve of moderate fineness three-fourths 
 of the weight in coarse residuum. But as 
 the solubility of the stone-meal, and thus its 
 efficiency, increases in proportion with its 
 fineness, the greatest possible circumspection 
 is required in grinding it. The finer the 
 stone dust the more energetically can the 
 dissolving moisture of the soil and the oxy- 
 gen and nitrogen of the air act upon it. A 
 grain of stone dust of moderate fineness 
 may be reduced in a mortar of agate per- 
 haps into twenty little particles, and then 
 every little particle may be rendered acces- 
 sible to the water and the air, and can, 
 therefore, be used as plant food. Thence it 
 follows that one single load of the very 
 finest stone-meal will do as much as twenty 
 loads of a coarser product, so that by reduc- 
 ing to the finest dust the cost for freight 
 and carriage and the use of horse and cart 
 would amount to only one-twentieth. There- 
 fore we can afford to pay unhesitatingly a 
 higher price for the finest stone-meal that 
 has been passed through a sieve than for an 
 article that may be not so much a fine 
 powder but rather a kind of coarse sand. 
 
 The average contents of ash in cereals 
 is about three per cent. Thence, from 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 55 
 
 three pounds of pure vegetable ashes we 
 could raise a hundred pounds of crops. 
 Now, as stone-meal properly made contains 
 an abundance of plant food in assimilable 
 form, it may be calculated to produce four 
 cwt. of cereals, or that an annual use of six 
 cwt. to the acre will produce twenty-four 
 cwt. of grain. On this basis every farmer 
 can calculate whether it will pay. But in 
 reality the harvest will be far greater, 
 because even without the stone-meal most 
 fields still possess some supply of mineral 
 nutriment for plants which will become 
 effective in addition thereto. Such being 
 the case we need not consider the fact that 
 not all the stone-meal is used up completely 
 in the first year, but yields nourishment to 
 plants even in the fifth year, as has been 
 shown by experiments. That no mistake 
 would be made by using double the quan- 
 tity on an acre, or twelve cwt. instead of six, 
 is manifest, for the prospects of a still 
 greater yield would thereby be improved, 
 but in applying twelve cwt. an abundance 
 would be supplied ; even five or six times 
 that quantity would be far from causing an 
 injury to the soil, but we cannot force by 
 excessive quantities of stone-meal a corre- 
 spondingly higher yield of crops for the 
 
56 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 reason that within a definite area only a 
 definite quantity of sunlight can display its 
 activity, and on this factor the growth of the 
 crop mainly depends. There is, therefore, 
 no use in passing beyond a certain quantity 
 of mineral manure ; it could only come into 
 use in subsequent years, and it appears to 
 be more practical to supply the amount 
 needed each year. 
 
 I will now present in summary form the 
 quintessence of the significance of this 
 natural fertilizer. 
 
 1. The point to be gained is not only a 
 greater quantity of produce, but also a better 
 quality. Sugar-beets gain thereby more 
 sugar, this, according to experiments made, 
 may amount to 75 per cent, more than 
 hitherto. Potatoes and cereals show a 
 greater proportion of starch. Oil crops 
 (as poppies, rape, etc.) show more seed- 
 vessels and a corresponding increase in oil.' 
 Pulse, such as beans, peas, etc., yields more 
 lecithin (oil containing phosphate of am- 
 monia as the chemical basis of nerve- 
 substance). Fruits and all vegetables re- 
 ceive a more delicate flavor. (The vegetables 
 in my garden have become famous with our 
 neighbors and our guests, so that they ask : 
 "How do you manage that?") Meadows 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 57 
 
 furnish grass and hay of more nutritive value. 
 Vines form-stronger shoots, give sweeter grajies 
 and are not touched by insects and fungous 
 diseases. 
 
 2. The soil is steadily built up and im- 
 proved by this natural fertilizer, as it is 
 progressively "normalized;" i. e., shows 
 gathered together potassa, soda, lime, mag- 
 nesia, fluorine, and phosphoric and sul- 
 phuric acid, etc., in the most favorable 
 combination. There is hardly one culti- 
 vated field which by nature is normal 
 at the present time. Either lime prevails 
 or we have a clayey soil, which through 
 its excess of clay refuses to let the rain 
 water pass, and by its toughness obstructs 
 the access of the atmospheric nitrogen 
 and of the carbonic acid; or we have a 
 mere sandy soil (quartz), or again the soil 
 has humus in excess, like the moor-land 
 soil. This latter is characterized by a pre- 
 dominance of lime and magnesia on the one 
 side, while sulphuric bases are two or three 
 times in excess of phosphatic bases, as is 
 shown by the analysis of the ashes of peat. 
 
 3, The value of the new fertilizer with re- 
 spect to the wholesomeness of nutritive 
 plants and fodder depends in great part on 
 the careful and intimate comixture of its 
 
58 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 several constituents, so that with every 
 little dust of potassa and soda the other nu- 
 tritive elements required to co-operate in 
 the harmonic construction of plants are at 
 their disposal in proximate vicinity. As a 
 contrast to this, in a one-sided fertilizing 
 with lime it may happen that the plant con- 
 tents itself with the lime so that the other 
 constituents of the soil are not drawn into 
 co-operation for the growth of the produce, 
 because they are not within the nearest 
 proximity of the root-fibres. This is, of 
 course, of great importance to the quality 
 and the nutritive value of the plants. 
 
 4. For raising nutritive plants and fodder 
 which may afford wholesome nourishment I 
 deem it of the greatest importance that no 
 substances should be used which lead to 
 ammoniacal decomposition. By such addi- 
 tions we may indeed produce a luxuriant, 
 excessive growth that blinds the eyes, and 
 in which the abundant formation of leaves 
 by means of nitrogen forms the chief part; 
 but no healthy growth is effected thereby. 
 From this point of view I would also depre- 
 cate the use of so-called fish guano. Every- 
 one knows how quickly fish pass over into 
 putrefaction; there is formed at the same 
 time a considerable quantity of propylamin 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 59 
 
 (C 3 H 6 , NH 3 ) which is an ammoniacal base. 
 The manure manufactured in Sweden from 
 fish-guano and powdered feldspar does not, 
 therefore, merit the esteem that it claims. 
 
 A CHAPTER FOR CHEMISTS. 
 
 The Chemical Process in the Growth of Plants 
 Which are the Basis of our Nutrition. 
 
 " Every leaf in the hedge sings to the wise 
 An excerpt from the wondrous lay of Creation! " 
 
 The sum and substance of the growth of 
 plants consists in creating out of burnt sub- 
 stances through the electrically decomposing 
 forces of the sun material which may again 
 be burned. 
 
 To take an example: A stearine candle, 
 consisting of hydro-carbons (C H H), in a 
 twenty-four fold aggregation, is consumed by 
 means of the oxygen of the air into carbonic 
 acid or carbon dioxide (C O O) and water 
 (H H O) and these same products of com- 
 bustion may through the vegetative pro- 
 cesses in plants be again wholly or partially 
 changed back into hydro-carbons. This is 
 effected by separating from the carbonic 
 acid dissolved in rain water or combined 
 with the moisture in the soil, water and to- 
 gether with this oxidized water (peroxide of 
 
60 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 hydrogen). In this way there arise from 
 two molecules of carbonic acid and two of 
 water, first of all oxalic acid (C 2 H 2 4 ) and 
 peroxide of hydrogen (O H H O). 
 
 GOO, H HO 
 C O O, H H O 
 
 C OOH|HO. 
 C O OHlHO. 
 
 The peroxide of hydrogen passes into the 
 atmosphere decomposed into watery vapor 
 and oxygen, while oxalic acid arising as the 
 first product of the reduction of carbonic 
 acid caused by the action of the sun is found 
 combined with lime in all vegetable cells. 
 Formerly this first process of growth (for 
 oxalic acid arises from the accretion of two 
 atoms of hydrogen to two molecules of car- 
 bonic acid) was not at all understood. It is 
 hardly four years ago that I heard a teacher 
 of agricultural economy say : " Lime has no 
 value in the growth of plants, it is rather 
 injurious than beneficial. The plant knows 
 not at all w^hat to do with the lime; in order 
 to rid itself more easily of it it takes it up 
 as oxalate of lime in the cells. " 
 
 Oxalic acid derives its name from the fact 
 that chemists first discovered it in wood- 
 sorrel (Oxalis) in the form of a combination of 
 oxalic acid with lime. From the oxalic 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 61 
 
 acid there proceeds in a continuous reduc- 
 tion sugar, the material of plant-cells and 
 starch . 
 
 The sugar that has been produced from 
 a symmetrical grouping of two molecules of 
 hydro-carbons, two of carbonic acid and two 
 of water. 
 
 HOH 
 HCH 
 HCH 
 
 oco 
 
 H OH 
 HCH 
 HCH 
 OCO 
 
 and which, therefore, is not yet a complete 
 product of reduction, produces with the 
 separation of carbonic acid and of water 
 through a heaped up grouping together of 
 hydro-carbons, which remain yet combined 
 with a molecule of formic acid, C O O H Hi 
 (this second product of production or rather 
 product of addition to Carbonic acid) then 
 the vegetable oils (olive oil, almond oil, 
 P°PP3 r oil, rapeseed oil, linseed oil, etc.) 
 
 Furthermore from sugar, which is exhib- 
 ited in all young plants during their sprout- 
 ing after receiving watery vapor and nitro- 
 gen from the air, and, indeed, after again 
 separating peroxide of hydrogen, while am- 
 monia arises, there are formed IST 2 H ]2 6 N 
 H 6 H 6 6 the numerous kinds of vegetable 
 albumen. 
 
62 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 The simplest kind of vegetable albumen 
 is fouud in asparagus, in the juice of as- 
 paragus. 
 
 HHOHH 
 
 C C 
 HH 
 
 CiNNHH 
 OHH 
 
 a combination of ammonia with malic acid, 
 which is a step towards the formation of 
 sugar or rather a product of splitting off 
 from sugar. 
 
 This asparagin is found not only in as- 
 paragus, but to select an example which may 
 easily be demonstrated also in the young 
 roots of thistles (which are weeded out from 
 asparagus beds) and which taste very much 
 like raw asparagus, and it is also found in 
 the sprouts of very many other plants. 
 
 As the simplest of all kinds of vegetable 
 albumen asparagus is the best exemplifica- 
 tion of the fact that in albumen intramo- 
 lecular gelatine sugar is contained : 
 
 H O H 
 
 CCM 
 H O H 
 
 Of the latter, however, it is ascertained 
 that on account of its contents of carbonic 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 63 
 
 acid it can condense into an organic whole 
 with itself basic substances (potash, soda, 
 magnesia, oxide of iron and oxide of man- 
 ganese), and owing to its basic ammonical 
 substratum it also condenses acids, and ac- 
 cordingly also at the same time both bases 
 and acids (e. g., sulphate of magnesia, phos- 
 phate of lime, the silicates of potash and of 
 soda, fluorate of lime), besides manganese 
 and oxide of iron, and there arise indeed on 
 account of the contents of the hydro-carbon 
 (H C H) in the gelatine sugar from insoluble 
 substances soluble combinations after the 
 analogy of the insoluble sulphate of baryta 
 and the ethyl sulphate of baryta which is 
 soluble in water. 
 
 And so we may comprehend how from 
 earthy elements in combination with sugar 
 and nitrogen there can arise in endless 
 modifications the most numerous varieties 
 of vegetable albumen, according as the soil 
 furnishes various substances. 
 
 In this the electrolytic force of the sun 
 plays the part of the architect. Like as in 
 the galvanic bath the atoms of the reduced 
 metals apply themselves into a connected 
 covering without a gap, so the solar forces 
 cement together the reduced elements of 
 the hydro-carbons with phosphates, sul- 
 
64 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 phates, muriates, fluorates, silicates and car- 
 bonates of lime, of potash, soda, magnesia, 
 and of the oxides of mangenese and iron to- 
 gether into the edifices which, as grasses, 
 herbs, bushes and trees, refresh our eyes 
 with their leaves and flowers, while their 
 fruits serve to nourish man as well as the 
 animal world. 
 
 But it is to be noticed that the above- 
 mentioned processes only take place under 
 the supposition that the carbonic acid, which 
 lays the foundation out of which the hydro- 
 carbons arise, find basic substances (potash, 
 soda, lime, magnesia, etc,) with which they 
 can condense themselves into firm combina- 
 tions. Therefore the firm earth is the abso- 
 lute condition for all vegetable growth, 
 there is no vegetation in the air alone; nor 
 must water be lacking (H H O), for its hy- 
 drogen (H H) being combustible in itself 
 renders the groups of hydro-carbons com- 
 bustible. 
 
 Now, as the process of our life represents 
 nothing else than a continual combustion 
 of our bodily substance by means of the 
 oxygen respired, with the condition that to 
 replace the substance consumed during the 
 day by oxidation, during the night new 
 combustible material must be supplied : by 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 65 
 
 the contents rich in soil of the lymphatic 
 vessels to the numerous nervous sheaths as 
 the oil of life, and to the renewing blood 
 new albuminous substance. Our life could 
 not continue if we should not renew so much 
 of the bodily material as is chemically con- 
 sumed by the oxidizing respiration by means 
 of the periodic supply of food. Every dis- 
 turbance in the regular supply of food has 
 the most manifest effects on the state of 
 the soul. The inexorable demand for new 
 material in place of the bodily substance 
 which is breathed away makes even men, 
 who by nature are kindly, angry and re- 
 gardless of others when their food is kept 
 back. And so cause and effect join them- 
 selves into a mischievous chain. 
 
 As the means for procuring food consists 
 in by far the greater number of callings in 
 coined money, and this is only given as a re- 
 ward for work done, the question arises : 
 What can the man do who has no opportun- 
 ity and chance to find paying work? He 
 will and must eat. If we can assist every 
 one in getting a supply of food the main- 
 spring for lying, deceit, stealing and numer- 
 ous crimes vanishes. 
 
 Food is supplied to us in the first place by 
 the immediate produce of the ground, and 
 
66 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 only in the second place by the fat, flesh and 
 blood of domestic animals produced from 
 grasses and herbs. 
 
 Now, as it is a primary chemical condition 
 that earthy material, air, water and solar 
 forces must be present in order that plants 
 may grow, it is the all-mother Earth which, 
 surrounded b}' water and earth and fructi- 
 fied by sunshine, nourishes men and animals 
 through the crops produced; and at the 
 same time it clothes animals, as their skin 
 causes the hair to sprout forth, which con- 
 tains sulphur and silica, and the hair by 
 isolating keeps together the bodily warmth 
 and the bodily electricity. 
 
 Man, whose producing spirit desires occu- 
 pation and to whom is granted the won- 
 derful mechanism of the fingers, has the 
 advantage that he can weave his garments 
 according to the season, either of flax and 
 cotton or of the wool of sheep and the hair 
 of goats, and can protect himself from the 
 wind, the weather and the cold by using the 
 wood from the forest to build his house and 
 to warm it. 
 
 Food, clothing and shelter are the funda- 
 mental requirements to which everyone 
 born has a claim, and these can also be 
 acquired by every one who has sound limbs. 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 67 
 
 In the muscles of our arms we possess the 
 fairy charm which can say : " Table be set!" 
 for labor always finds its reward. Of course 
 if people are foolish enough to leave the 
 places where the muscles of their arms are 
 in demand and paid for, if they leave the 
 source of all earthly riches, agriculture and 
 go where their arms have no value, because 
 many others that are unemployed are wait- 
 ing for employment, then distress, lack of 
 food, of clothing and shelter must give him 
 the occasion to consider and turn back, 
 returning to a life in the country, which is 
 continually becoming more deprived of its 
 inhabitants. 
 
 Every work brings its reward. Work is 
 necessary for our bodily and mental well- 
 being. By co-operation it confirms us in the 
 consciousness of a common humanity, for in 
 social life we see in every fellow man an 
 image of ourselves and this calls for mutual 
 regard, charity, kindliness, mutual assist- 
 ance. How different with the man who is 
 not working. His thoughts turn to laying 
 nets and setting traps in which to catch his 
 unsuspecting fellow men. 
 
 Further, when the knowledge will have 
 spread more and more that the essential 
 work of man consists in allowing the sun to 
 
68 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 work for Him, in order that food, raiment 
 and wood may grow up from earth, water 
 and air, then many foolish outbirths of idle 
 brains will lose their soil and foundation. 
 
 There are, indeed, in these times some 
 bad calculators who say : We will work 
 less and get more money. These do not con- 
 sider that the more money is in circulation, 
 so much more money must be paid for the 
 materials of food, if these remain the same 
 in quantity, and this change will be of in- 
 definite limits. The real remedy can only 
 consist in producing more food. The more 
 grain is raised^ the less money will be re- 
 quired to buy it. Here we must apply our 
 lever. What infatuation, when men attack 
 one another in order to compel the supply 
 of sufficient food. That can only be furnished 
 by the earth. " Does a cornfield grow in my 
 palm?" God has created us rich enough in 
 supplying us with an understanding. If we 
 use this, brother need not overreach brother, 
 but we can in serene tranquillity of soul win 
 the little that we need day by day from our 
 all-mother Earth. 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 69 
 
 STONE-MEAL AS A TOBACCO FERTILIZER. 
 
 Of late years the general attention of 
 tobacco growers centered in the query 
 "What is the best manure for obtaining a 
 good tobacco?" For it stands to reason 
 that, if for a number of years tobacco is 
 grown on the same fields, in the course of 
 time the soil must be rendered bare of the 
 constituents entering into the remarkable 
 quantity of ash which tobacco contains. 
 There is no other product of the soil which 
 gives as much ashes as does tobacco, for the 
 best dried leaves will yield from 14 to 27 
 per cent., while, for example, dried ash or 
 beech leaves only yield 4f per cent., and 
 most other plants contain still less, dried 
 pine needles only 1^ per cent. In the ash 
 of most plants yielding 2 per cent, or* more 
 silex predominates ash and beech ashes con- 
 taining over one-third, while the ash of 
 barley and oat straw consists one-half of 
 silex. It is, however, quite different with 
 tobacco ash, which contains only one- 
 twentieth part of silex, the rest being lime, 
 magnesia, potash, soda, phosphoric and sul- 
 phuric acid. There is no fixed rule in the 
 
70 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 proportion of these substances, but lime and 
 potash always predominate in about the 
 proportion of five to four parts. 
 
 German tobacco yields less ash than Vir- 
 ginia leaf, only about 14 per cent., and con- 
 sists of about five parts of lime, four of pot- 
 ash,' one of magnesia, one-half of soda, 
 two-thirds of phosphoric acid, four-fifths of 
 sulphuric acid, four-fifths of silex and one 
 part of muriatic acid. 
 
 The less of sulphuric and muriatic acid a 
 tobacco contains the freer will it burn and 
 the whiter its ash will be. The best tobacco 
 is raised with nothing but wood ashes for 
 manure, and be it noted that the ashes of 
 oak, beech, birch, pine and fir contain not a 
 trace of muriatic acid and but one-fiftieth 
 per cent, of sulphuric acid. We are forced, 
 therefore, to the inevitable conclusion that 
 the comparatively high percentage of sul- 
 phuric and muriatic acid which the ash of 
 German tobacco yields and which makes its 
 present quality so poor is owing to the per- 
 sistent use of stable manure, and it is plainly 
 of the utmost importance to do without that 
 altogether. 
 
 The question now arises what shall be 
 used in its stead ? Our answer, is that inas- 
 much as forest trees are grown on rocky soil 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 71 
 
 which contains potash, soda, lime and mag- 
 nesia in combination with silica alumina and 
 phosphoric acid we must, instead of burning 
 the expensive trees for the purpose of ob- 
 taining their ashes for tobacco manure, go 
 back to the original substances out of which 
 the trees were created, and these are suitable 
 minerals found in the rocks. This is as plain 
 a proposition as the egg of Columbus. 
 
 With regard to Virginia tobacco a study 
 of the topographical features of the tobacco 
 lands will be in order. The best soil for the 
 purpose is found where the debris of the 
 Alleghenies and their foot hills the blue 
 mountains has been washed down into the 
 plain. These mountains contain gneis, gran- 
 ite, syenite, serpentin and hornblend slate. 
 Hornblend is silica combined with lime, 
 magnesia and iron. In syenite lime and 
 magnesia predominate over potash and soda; 
 Virginia gneis abounds in lime, magnesia 
 and potash ; serpentin is a silicate of mag- 
 nesia and iron. These lime and magnesia 
 silicates are of far more importance for the 
 production of a fine tobacco which will burn 
 freely making a white and firm ash than 
 the potash which is found in all primitive 
 rocks, although potash is necessary for the 
 production of elastic leaf cells so much ap- 
 
72 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 predated in good tobacco. But it is a great 
 mistake to lay undue stress on an over- 
 abundance of potash. Neither the Strassfurt 
 potash salts nor powdered iron slag will pro- 
 duce good tobacco. For the potash contained 
 in tobacco is not combined therein with sul- 
 phuric and muriatic acid, but enters into 
 direct combination with cell material, and it 
 is eliminated out of silicated potash and 
 soda by the action of the carbonic acid of 
 the air or of the soil. A healthy and fine 
 quality of tobacco can therefore only be 
 grown by the use of a liberal supply of a 
 mineral mixture which yields in appropriate 
 proportions silicate of potash and soda to- 
 gether with carbonate of lime and magnesia 
 and a small proportion of phosphoric acid, 
 such as was present originally in the virgin 
 soil of the tobacco lands of Virginia. 
 
 In accordance with these principles suit- 
 able mixtures of the several kinds of rocks 
 have been prepared in the form of very fine 
 powder for the production of fine tobacco, 
 and it is at present being used with great 
 success in the Palatinate in Germany. 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 73 
 
 A PAPER CONTRIBUTED TO THE 
 
 "DEUTSCHES ADELSBLATT," 
 
 JANUARY 31st, 1892. 
 
 In cereals, in the seeds of the leguminous 
 plants, and of the oil-bearing plants, the 
 mineral substances with which the cellular 
 tissue and the vegetable albumen are com- 
 bined constitute from 17 to 50 thousand. 
 After the combustion of plant tissue these 
 mineral constituents remain behind as ashes, 
 and the greater part of the ashes in the 
 seeds consist of phosphoric acid and polassa, 
 while soda, lime, magnesia, hydrochloric 
 acid, sulphuric and silicic acid with manga- 
 nese; iron and fluorine are comparative^ 
 less in quantity. Only in the oil-producing 
 seeds (mustard, rapeseed, linseed, hempseed 
 and poppyseed) lime and magnesia make a 
 considerable part of the ashes. The follow- 
 ing numerical proportion will give a general 
 view: 
 
 Winter wheat has on the average 16 8-10 
 thousandths of ashes, of which phosphoric 
 acid forms 7 9-10 thousandths and 5 2-10 of 
 potassa. 
 
 Field beans yield 31 thousandths of ashes, of 
 
74 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 which phosphoric acid forms 16 2-10, potassa 
 7, lime 18 and magnesia 5 thousandths. 
 
 Poppy seed gives 51 5-10 thousandths of 
 ashes, of which 16 2-10 are phosphoric acid, 
 potassa 7, lime 18 and magnesia 5. 
 
 From the fact that phosphoric acid and 
 potassa have such a prominence in nutritive 
 crops, it was easy to draw this conclusion: 
 " That potassa and phosphoric acid are the 
 most necessary fertilizers, and the more phos- 
 phoric acid the better.^ But this conclusion 
 is erroneous and has caused us much injury 
 since Liebig made this statement. 
 
 Liebig and his successors have overlooked 
 the fact, that in the time of vegetation phos- 
 phoric acid is so uniformly distributed that 
 it does not amount in the average to more 
 than one-tenth of the mineral constituents. 
 If during the process of ripening phosphoric 
 acid strongly accumulates in the seeds, that 
 it constitutes not merely 10, but 30 to 50 per 
 cent, of the ashes, this is explained by the 
 fact that the acid passes from the stems, 
 stalks and leaves into the seeds, leaving the 
 straw very poor in phosphoric acid, as may 
 appear from these proportions : 
 
 («.) The straw of winter wheat has in the 
 average 46 thousandths of ashes, of which 
 only 2 2-10, thus about 1-20 or 5 per cent. 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 75 
 
 consist of phosphoric acid. The rest con- 
 sists of 6 potassa, 0.6 soda, 2.7 lime, 1.1 mag- 
 nesia, 1.1 sulphuric acid, 0.8 hydrochloric 
 acid and 31 thousandths of silicic acid. The 
 latter (silica) only amounts to 0.3 of one 
 thousandth in the wheat grain thus in com- 
 parison with the straw only one thousandth. 
 
 (6.) The straw of field bean furnishes 45 
 thousandths of ashes, of which only 2.9 are 
 phosphoric acid, thus 1-15 or 6i per cent., 
 while in the ashes of the seeds it constitutes 
 36 per cent. The other substances contained 
 in bean straw are 19.4 thousandths potassa, 
 0.8 soda, 12 lime, 2.6 magnesia, 1.8 sulphuric 
 acid, 2.0 hydrochloric acid and 3.2 silicic 
 acid. On account of this small quantity of 
 silica bean straw is soft, while wheat straw, 
 rich in silica, is hard. 
 
 (c.) The straw of poppy gives about 48|- 
 thousandths of ashes, of which there are 
 only 1.6 of phosphoric acid; ?'. e., in poppy 
 straw phosphoric acid constitutes only 1-30 
 of the ashes, while in the seeds it amounts 
 to ^. So considerable, amounting to the ten- 
 fold, is the difference. The rest of the ashes 
 of the straw of poppy consists of 18.4 
 potassa, 0.6 soda, 14.7 lime, 3.1 magnesia, 2.5 
 sulphuric acid, 1.3 hydrochloric acid and 5.5 
 silicic acid. 
 
76 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 The examples adduced are to a certain 
 degree typical of cereals, leguminous plants 
 and oil-yielding plants and they explain why 
 leguminous and oily plants need more lime 
 in the soil than cereals. On the whole, when 
 we take the average of 70 or 80 analyses of 
 field-crops, which also include the roots, 
 stems and leaves, we come to the conclusion 
 that phosphoric acid constitutes about one- 
 tenth of the mineral constituents, while 
 potassa, soda, lime, magnesia, silica, sul- 
 phuric acid, chlorine and fluorine contribute 
 the remaining nine-tenths. Furthermore, 
 potassa and soda are present on the average 
 in the same amount of weight as lime and 
 magnesia. These four bases amount to 
 about eight-tenths of the whole quantity of 
 the ashes, and it is found in practice that 
 these bases may to a considerable degree act 
 as substitutes for one another, without per- 
 ceptibly varying the form and the organic 
 constituents of these plants. 
 
 According to these facts a fertilizer which 
 would satisfy the natural demand of supply- 
 ing the minerals necessary for the construc- 
 tion of plants should contain to one part of 
 phosphoric acid eight parts of potassa, soda, 
 lime and magnesia, if we are willing to leave 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 77 
 
 out of our count phosphoric, hydrochloric 
 and silicic acid. 
 
 Such a fertilizer, however, is found in every 
 primitive rock. Primitive rocks do not, 
 indeed, contain more than one per cent, of 
 phosphoric acid, but that is quite sufficient ; 
 it is, indeed, the measure wisely appointed 
 by the Creator of all things, for the other 
 constituents of granite, porphyry, etc., which 
 serve for the nourishment of plants, consist 
 of about six per cent, of potassa and soda 
 and two per cent, of lime and magnesia. 
 The residue of the rock serves as a substance 
 dispersed between the basic substances to 
 keep them apart, and they are dissolved out 
 of their combination with silicic acid only as 
 they are applied to use. Thence we receive 
 such wholesome cereals from mountainous 
 countries ; e. g. } from Hungary, encircled by 
 the Carpathian Mountains, in contrast with 
 the prevalence of diseases due to the decom- 
 position of the blood of men and of animals 
 in the exhausted plains which are supplied 
 with stable manure. 
 
 If we wish to grasp quickly and com- 
 pletely the correctness and importance of 
 mineral manure, we need only to consider 
 the cases of Uruguay and Argentinia or of 
 Egypt; or, to mention an example from our 
 
78 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 proximate vicinity, that of the principality 
 of Birkenfeld. 
 
 In Uruguay and Argentinia the live stock 
 is estimated at about thirty-two millions 
 (beeves, sheep and horses). Of these there 
 are now killed for export every year about 
 one and a quarter millions and the bones of 
 these animals are carried by the shiploads 
 to Hamburg, in order to be worked up into 
 bone-black to be used in the sugar refineries. 
 It is self-evident that the animals take the 
 phosphate of lime for their bones and the 
 nitrogen for their flesh and for the glue in 
 their bones from the grass they eat. But 
 the grass draws the necessary nitrogen 
 from the air, for they use no fertilizers, and 
 the phosphate of lime, which continually 
 passes from the country in the form of bones 
 is received by the grass from the inexhausti- 
 ble calcareous porphyritic mud which is 
 carried down through millions of gorges 
 from the Cordilleras by the mountain 
 streams and which flows as a primitive 
 manure into the eastern plains. In Egypt 
 this is effected by the Nile mud, which the 
 mountain streams bring down and which is 
 conveyed by the Nile in fructifying abund- 
 ance to the Delta, which thereby becomes 
 the granary of Egypt. 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 79 
 
 But we need not go so far even. The 
 little principality of Birkenfeld demonstrates 
 the fertility of the primary rocks which the 
 mountains of the Hundsruecken supplies in 
 the form of argillaceous slate. It is a little 
 Argentinia. The trade in cattle plays an 
 important part in Birkenfeld. Besides this 
 oil factories, linen factories and beer brew- 
 eries prove that cereals and oil plants, rich 
 in phosphorus, and among them flax, rich in 
 potassa, find there good nutritive supplies. 
 The forests consist mainly of deciduous 
 trees and harbor much game. Trees need 
 phosphoric acid for their roots, trunks and 
 bark, and the game needs phosphate of lime 
 for the bones. The ashes of oak wood and 
 beech wood contain 6 per cent, of phos- 
 phoric acid, and that of the horse-chestnut 
 contains 7 per cent. So richly does the ar- 
 gillaceous slate furnish the nutritious ele- 
 ments for the growth of plants and especially 
 the right quantity of phosphoric acid. 
 
 In contrast with these natural fertilizers 
 what has our prudent and learned fertilizing 
 with phosphoric acid effected? It has 
 brought it about that we don't know how to 
 save ourselves from the phylloxera, the ne- 
 matodes, hay-worm, spring-worm and sour- 
 worm nor from the fungi causing rust and 
 
80 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 blight. The more phosphoric acid the more 
 parasites, for fungi and parasites need the 
 phosphatic protoplasm which accumulates 
 in seeds and fruits as an essential condition 
 of their existence. If we wish to limit these 
 plagues to a sufferable degree we must sup- 
 ply our fields that have been deluged with 
 phosphoric acid with natural plant-food, 
 with pulverized rocks, with lime and 
 gypsum. 
 
 Of many communications received which 
 confirm the above, we would like to cite a 
 few which are especially instructive, as it 
 shows that these evils have become so great 
 as to urgently demand relief. The repre- 
 sentative of a great vineyard estate on the 
 upper Rhine writes as follows: 
 
 "For years I have seen clearly that we 
 make a great mistake in our cultivation of 
 fields, gardens and vineyards, but only on 
 reading your books have I seen that all our 
 methods of fertilizing hitherto have been 
 one-sided, and that, therefore, they are inef- 
 fectual. Stable manure on some soils and 
 for some crops may be sufficient, but it is 
 not a universal fertilizer. We see this 
 plainly here in the Rheingau, in the young 
 vines, which are manured every two or 
 three years with cow dung, and, indeed, 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 81 
 
 great quantities of it. A gladsome, luxuri- 
 ant growth and a rich yield of grapes are 
 not produced, though we furnish the grape- 
 vines with the potassa, phosphoric acid and 
 nitrogen in so great quantities that the 
 shoots, the grapes and the leaves ought to 
 display the utmost luxuriance; but instead 
 of this everything in the vineyards here 
 looks sickly and poor. I should, therefore, 
 be very glad and grateful to you if you 
 would give us your views about this. It 
 would be a great benefit, not only to our- 
 selves, but to the whole of the Rheingau, 
 and wherever grape-vines are cultivated, to 
 be delivered from the miseries of the spring- 
 worm, hay-worm and sour-worm, the phyl- 
 loxera and the Peronospora viticola, and if 
 this can be done by your method all culti- 
 vators of the grape-vine will exclaim: God 
 be praised ! " 
 
 I answered that the usual manure does 
 not lack any necessary ingredient, but there 
 is in it too much of somr things', i. e., of nitro- 
 gen and phosphoric acid. Men must return 
 to the original material, restore to the soil 
 its natural original qualities by bringing to 
 the fields soil that has not been exhausted, 
 which may be done in the form of powdered 
 primitive rocks mingled with sulphates and 
 6 
 
82 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 carbonate of lime and magnesia. The cor- 
 rectness of such belief is attested by the fol- 
 lowing correspondence with a landscape 
 gardener and nursery man from the Rhein- 
 provinz: 
 
 "We would like to ask you for some in- 
 formation as to what we had best use for 
 manuring our nurseries. We have clayey, 
 deep, light soil, formerly a forest. We cul- 
 tivate roses, fruit trees and forest trees, also 
 evergreen plants, firs and various kinds of 
 cypresses. It is quite peculiar that quinces 
 and other fruits (Formobst) in the second 
 year after grafting absolutely refuse to grow 
 any more despite of the use of stable manure, 
 iron slag or of Chili nitre." 
 
 I answered that deep, clayey forest soil 
 while retaining its clay and silica has been 
 deprived of its basic constituents (potassa, 
 soda, lime and magnesia) which in the pro- 
 cess of time have passed over into the wood 
 of the roots and of the trunks, and that the 
 only thing promising relief is fresh rock 
 meal. For are not the Balkan countries the 
 home of the looses, and do not the Haemus 
 Mountains consist of porphyry, granite and 
 gneiss, but not of stable manure and clay? 
 Do not cypresses grow in the regions of the 
 Appennines, which furnish the nourishing 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 83 
 
 material from their granite and gneiss. 
 And do not firs grow on mountains of granite 
 and porphyry? Finally fruit? The Bohe- 
 mian Mountains furnish it in abundance, and 
 indeed free from worms. This latter fact, 
 that the use of stone-meal causes worms to 
 cease, was lately confirmed by Mr. Fischer, 
 M. D., of Westend. near Charlottenburg, who 
 introduced stone-meal manure two years 
 ago in his garden, situated on a sandy soil. 
 He reported about it in the Januai^ number 
 of the Deutsche Pomologen-Verein. 
 
 From a third letter I quote as follows: 
 "Manor L. — I am glad to see a chemist 
 who has the courage to openly oppose the 
 swindle of the artificial manures. Within 
 a series of ten years I bought at least $17-, 
 000 worth of artificial fertilizers, of which 
 sum over $6,000 were paid for Chili nitre. I 
 harvested more every year; but what? 
 Nothing but straw, lodged grain and cereals 
 of low grade. For the last two years I have 
 bought, in addition, animal manure and 
 lime, and I find that at a slight expense 
 everything is being changed and that the 
 field will again bring in what I lost in 
 former years. When the Thomas phosphate 
 was introduced, as it was cheap, I used at 
 once 2,000 cwt. With 7 cwt. per acre an 
 
84 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 effect was indeed seen, but what was it that 
 acted? surely only the lime. What you 
 have affirmed I have long felt. That many 
 of us agriculturists are faring so badly is for 
 the most part owing to this nuisance of our 
 artificial, expensive and useless fertilizers." 
 
 A fourth letter with an excerpt, of which 
 I will conclude, contains the following: 
 
 " Twenty years ago, while in office in 
 Alsatia, I endeavored to make myself ac- 
 quainted and familiar with all manner of 
 subjects. I was lead to the idea of mineral 
 fertilizers or manures, when I heard and saw 
 that in the intersecting valleys of the 
 Vosges Mountains the winter torrents cov- 
 ered the lowlands with granitic debris, which 
 after a few years became very fruitful soil; 
 but I had no opportunity or occasion to fol- 
 low out this idea any further, which is now, 
 however, the case." (G. L., Privy Councillor 
 of war a D.) 
 
 Every such letter contains new confirma- 
 tory facts ; I have quite a collection of such 
 correspondence, but will not weary you by 
 quoting more. 
 
 Julius Hensel. 
 
 Hermsdorf unterm Kynast. 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 85 
 
 STONE-MEAL MANURE. 
 
 (Pioneer, July 22, 1892.) 
 
 " Bread from stones : and thus forsooth 
 The Bible words maintain their truth." 
 
 I have before this taken occasion, in the 
 "Deutsche Adelsblatt" to show that calling 
 the stone dust "manure'' is really not cor- 
 rect, as it is superior to the so-called manures 
 in this that it restores the natural conditions 
 for the growth of crops, while manures only 
 present an artificial help and thus a make- 
 shift. The whole state of the case is as 
 follows : 
 
 In the beginning plants grew without any 
 artificial addition from the soil formed of 
 disintegrated material from the mountains. 
 The carbonic acid of the air combined with 
 the basic constituents, potassa, soda, lime, 
 magnesia, iron and manganese, which were 
 combined in the disintegrated rock-material 
 with silicic acid, alumina, sulphur, phos- 
 phorous, chlorine and fluorine, and with the 
 co-operation of moisture by the operation of 
 the heat and light of the sun it produced 
 vegetable cell-tissue. The gaseous sub- 
 stances, carbonic acid (carbon dioxide), 
 
86 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 ivatery vapor and the nitrogen of the air ac- 
 quire the firm forms of vegetable cellular 
 tissue and vegetable albumen solely through 
 the basic foundation of potassa, soda, lime 
 and magnesia, without which no root, stalk, 
 leaf or fruit is found ; for whether we burn 
 the leaves of maples or of beech trees, the 
 roots of burdocks or of willows, grains of 
 rye or wood, straw or linen, pears, cherries 
 or rape seed, there always remains a resi- 
 duum of ashes which, in various proportions, 
 consists of potassa, soda, lime, magnesia, 
 iron, manganese, phosphoric acid, sulphuric 
 acid, fluorine and silica. With respect to 
 nitrogen this with watery vapor forms in the 
 presence of iron, which is present in all 
 soils, becomes ammonia according to the 
 formula N 2 ,H 6 3 ,Fe 2 =N 2 H 6 ,Fe 2 3 (all iron- 
 rust that is formed in the nightly dew out 
 of metallic iron Fe 2 3 , contains ammonia, as 
 Eilard Mitscherlich has proved). The solidi- 
 fication of the cellular tissue arising from 
 carbonic acid and water will be best under- 
 stood by comparing it with the process of 
 the formation of hard soap by the combina- 
 tion of oil with soda, potassa, lime or any 
 other basic substance, as, e. g. } oxide of lead, 
 quicksilver or iron. Ammonia also forms 
 soap with oxidized oil, oleic acid. We can 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 87 
 
 hardly find any better comparison by which 
 to explain the solidification of the atmos- 
 pheric vapors (carbonic acid, water, nitrogen 
 and oxygen) in combination with earthy 
 substances or in substitution for the latter 
 with ammonia into vegetable substance 
 than on the one side this process of saponi- 
 fication and ou the other hand the oil- 
 substance which is the basis of soap. The 
 production of oil substance consists in this 
 that combustible substances -(hydro-carbons) 
 are generated from burned-up substances 
 (carbonic acid and water) and this charac- 
 terizes in the main the nature of the uni- 
 versal vegetation of plants. A burning 
 stearine candle is transformed into carbonic 
 acid gas and watery vapor, but these aeri- 
 form products, in combination with earths, 
 are again transmuted into combustible 
 wood, sugar, starch and oil by the opera- 
 tion of the sun. Wherever new earth comes 
 into activity, as at the foot of mountains, 
 there is found a vigorous growth of plants, 
 especially when a sufficiency of carbonic 
 acid clings to the rock as in the Jura 
 regions. The road from Basel to Biel is 
 very instructive in this respect. On the 
 contrary, it is seen that in densely populated 
 regions as, e. g., in China and Japan, after a 
 
88 Bread from stones. 
 
 cultivation of many thousands of years, the 
 earth, exhausted of the material that forms 
 cells, is of itself unwilling to produce as 
 many nutritive plants as men and animals 
 need for their sustenance ; but as had been 
 perceived that the nourishment which has 
 been consumed, in so far as it has not been 
 used in the new formation of lymphatic fluid 
 and blood, being therefore superfluous, leaves 
 the body through the digestive canal al- 
 though chemically disintegrated and putre- 
 fied, nevertheless produces new vegetation 
 when this material is brought on the fields 
 and is mixed with earth ; in China they col- 
 lect with great care not only whatever has 
 passed through the intestinal canal, but also 
 the product of the bodily substance which 
 is consumed by respiration, which is elimi- 
 nated as the secretion of the kidneys and 
 which also gives an impulse to new growth. 
 One or the other must take place. 
 Either unexhausted new soil or the restora- 
 tion of the nutrition consumed to the soil of 
 the fields. Where the latter has not been 
 done, as by the first European settlers in 
 America, the crops decreased and the set- 
 tlers moved from the east further to the 
 west, in order to gain enough cereals from 
 the as yet unexhausted soil for export to 
 
bread From stones. 89 
 
 Europe. Now they have also come to see in 
 America that they cannot continue thus, as 
 there are no more domains without owners 
 into which they can emigrate without let or 
 hindrance. 
 
 But how is it with us in Germany in this 
 respect? After the soil would not yield any 
 more, despite of deep plowing, the circle in- 
 stituted in China was also put into practice. 
 They had to see that the solid and liquid 
 manure of the domestic animals brought on 
 the fields produced a new growth, and the 
 dungheaps began to be valued. By the aid 
 of this dung the fields were kept fertile, al- 
 though this was a mere makeshift. This 
 makeshift has become a familiar one for 
 several centuries, so that even in the times 
 of our great-grandfathers the saying was in 
 vogue : " Where there is no manure nothing 
 will grow." So eventually what was a mere 
 makeshift has become the regular rule. As 
 a consequence of this traditional view 
 the conclusion followed: In order to get a 
 large quantity of manure we must keep as 
 many cattle as practicable. In this it was 
 overlooked that the cattle would require 
 again as much acreage for their nutrition, 
 and the ground thus used could not be used 
 to raise grain, so that in such an economy it 
 
90 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 was necessary to work the fields for the sake 
 of the cattle not for the sake of the. men. 
 But finally the thoughtful and book-keeping 
 farmers had to come to the conclusion that 
 the raising of cattle only pays in mountain- 
 ous districts, or in districts like the marshes 
 of Holstein, which are kept fruitful by the 
 continual washing down of Geest-rocks. 
 
 I can only summarize here. As above 
 said, the dungheap had been recognized as 
 the augmenter of fertility, and dungheaps 
 were cousidered as the natural condition, 
 sine qva non, for the growth of crops, al- 
 though this was by no means founded on the 
 natural order, but was only a makeshift. 
 When once the rule was established that the 
 artificial was normal we need not be sur- 
 prised that when the stable manure would 
 no more suffice some people recommended 
 artificial manure. As these people gave 
 themselves great airs of learning the well- 
 educated, large land-owners fell into their 
 net, even more than the simple peasants, 
 and therewith the general retrocession of 
 agricultural produce in the level regions 
 was for some time at least fixed and sealed. 
 
 It may easily be seen that oxen and cows, 
 no matter how high their cost, charged no 
 salary for producing their manure. It was 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. . 91 
 
 otherwise with the chemists and the dealers 
 in artificial manure. These not only de- 
 manded to be nourished themselves, but also 
 desired from the gain produced by their 
 business to educate their children, to build 
 their magazines, to pay their traveling 
 agents and to increase their capital. This 
 business like all those which supply neces- 
 saries proved so remunerative that one of the 
 greatest houses dealing in artificial manures 
 in a short time had made millions, which 
 were paid them by the farmers without re- 
 ceiving an equivalent; for in spite of the 
 most energetic application of artificial ma- 
 nures the crops steadily decreased. How 
 could it be otherwise? Plants need potassa, 
 soda, lime, magnesia, iron, manganese, sul- 
 phur, phosphorus and fluorine, and in the 
 artificial fertilizers they only received ex- 
 pensive potassa, phosphoric acid and nitro- 
 gen for their nourishment. 
 
 The consequence of this showed itself first 
 of all in frequent bankruptcies of agricult- 
 urists. But besides this, nitrogenous fertil- 
 izers in the form of Chili nitre have caused 
 a predominance of cattle diseases. That hares 
 and deer have been found dead in numbers 
 in places which had been fertilized with 
 Chili nitre I have read in at least twenty 
 
92 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 newspapers, and it has also been reported to 
 me by eye-witnesses. As in the open air so 
 also in the stables. No normal animal bodily 
 substance can be formed from fodder ma- 
 nured with nitrogen, especially no whole- 
 some milk equal to that from cows feeding 
 ou mountain herbs. 
 
 It is not to be computed how great an in- 
 jury to health with men and animals has 
 been caused by stable manure. Milk pro- 
 duced from ammoniacal plants paved the 
 way by which the destructive spirit diph- 
 theria has swooped down after measles, 
 scarlatina, scrofula, pneumonia had be- 
 come the familiar companions of the Ger- 
 mans, who betore were strong as bears. 
 Artificial manure at last put the crown on 
 this work of destruction. 
 
 How could this happen? Very simply. 
 Liebig was the first agricultural chemist. 
 He found that the ashes which remained 
 from grain mainly consisted of phosphate of 
 potassa. From this he concluded that phos- 
 phate of potassa must be restored to the 
 soil, and that was very one-sided. Liebig 
 had forgotten to take the straw into ac- 
 count, in which only small quantities of 
 phosphoric acid are found, because this sub- 
 stance during the process of maturing passes 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 93 
 
 from the stalk into the grain. If lie had 
 not only calculated the seed but also the 
 roots and the stalks, he would have found 
 what we know at this day, that in the whole 
 plants there is as much lime and magnesia 
 as potassa and soda, and that phosphoric 
 acid forms only the tenth part of the sum of 
 these basic constituents. Unfortunately 
 Liebig also was of the opinion that potassa 
 and phosphoric acid has to be restored to 
 the soil as such, while any one might have- 
 concluded that instead of the exhausted soil 
 we must supply earthy material from which 
 nothing has been .grown. Such untouched 
 earthy material of primitive strength 
 we get by pulverizing rocks in which 
 potassa, soda, lime, magnesia, manganese, 
 and iron are combined with silica, alumina, 
 phosphoric acid, fluorine and sulphur. 
 Among these substances fluorine, which is 
 found in all mica-minerals, has been neglected 
 by Liebig and by all his followers, and has 
 never been contained in any artificial 
 manure. But as we know from later in- 
 vestigations that fluorine is regular^ found 
 even in the white and yellow of bird's eggs, 
 we must acknowledge it is something essen- 
 tial to the organism. Chickens get this 
 fluorine and the other earthy constituents, 
 
94 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 when thej* have a chance to pick up little 
 slivers of granite. Where this is denied 
 them, as in a wooden hen house, they suc- 
 cumb to chicken cholera and chicken diph- 
 theria. 
 
 We men are not as well off as the birds of 
 the heavens. We must eat the soup prepared 
 for us by the dealers in artificial manures. 
 Since these sell no fluorine our cereals suffer 
 a lack in fluorine, and as no normal bony 
 substance can be formed without fluorine in 
 the same degree as the number of dealers in 
 fertilizers increased the army of dentists 
 and the erection of orthopedic institutes in- 
 creased ; but the latter were unable to re- 
 move the curvature of the spine in our chil- 
 dren. The enamel of the teeth needs 
 fluorine, the albumen and the yolk of the 
 eggs require fluorine, the bones of the spine 
 require fluorine, the pupil of the eye also 
 needs fluorine. It is not by accident that 
 Homoeopathy cures numerous affections of 
 the eye with fluoride of calcium. 
 
 How rich, how strong and how healthy 
 will we Germans be when we make our 
 mountains tributary to yield new soil from 
 which new wholesome cereals may be formed. 
 We need then no more send our savings to 
 Russia, to Hungary, to America, but will 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 95 
 
 make our way through life by our strong 
 elbows and with German courage, and shall 
 keep off our adversaries. 
 
 The goal aimed at, of satisfying the hun- 
 gry, and of preventing numerous maladies 
 by restoring the natural condition for Avhole- 
 some plant growth, seems to me one of the 
 highest and the most noble. Even six cwt. 
 •of prepared stone-dust to the Prussian mor- 
 gen (— one-fourth hectare, or about 10 cwt. 
 to the acre) will give sufficient nourishment 
 for a satisfactory crop, if this amount is sup- 
 plied every year. If more is used, the yield 
 may be so much the more increased. 
 
 I conclude these remarks, which were in- 
 troduced with a motto that adorned the 
 exhibit in Leipzig of the produce yielded by 
 stone-dust, by reproducing also the second 
 rhyme which had been introduced there, and 
 which, like the motto, has a conscientious 
 adherent of mineral manure for its author : 
 " Art we love, but never can endure 
 To see the artificial in manure." 
 
 Julius Hensel. 
 
 Hermsdorf unterm Kynast. 
 
CONTRIBUTIONS FROM OTHER SOURCES. 
 
 STONE-MEAL. 
 
 By Herm. Fischer, M.D., Westend, Charlotten- 
 burg. 
 
 From No. 1 of Pomologische Monatshefte, 1892, 
 Edited by Friedrich Lucas, Director of 
 
 Pomological Institute in Reutlingen. 
 Not only those who like to eat fruit and 
 vegetables, but much more those who raise 
 fruits and vegetables rejoice in the abundant 
 and savory produce of our gardens. To 
 maintain this produce and, if possible, to in- 
 crease it is the endeavor of rational horti- 
 culture. This end is striven for through 
 careful cultivation, and more especially by 
 abundant manuring, especiall} r with nitroge- 
 nous compounds. I say this end is striven 
 for, but it is not always reached. The long- 
 continued labors of a well-known investi- 
 gator, Julius Hensel, have opened new pros- 
 pects for agriculture, fruit raising and 
 horticulture; they show, in fact, how we can 
 u turn stones into bread." Hensel's book, 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 97 
 
 " Das Leben," has lately appeared in a second 
 edition. Eveiy thinking reader will find a 
 high enjoyment in the study of this book. 
 For our present consideration I recommend 
 especially Chapter XXX., p. 476, " Agricul- 
 ture and Foresti^y." Latety a little work, 
 b}' the same author, has appeared on " Min- 
 eral Manure the Natural Way for Solving 
 the Social Question," published by the 
 author at Hermsdorf unterm Kynast, Silesia. 
 The first part of the pamphlet is devoted to 
 the defensive, for like all pioneers our author 
 meets with violent opposition from the 
 orthodox teachers of agriculture, whose cues 
 and periwigs have come into a great state of 
 agitation. 
 
 After his defense the author passes to his 
 theme proper. Earth, air, water and sun- 
 light must co-operate to produce a fruitful 
 growth. We entrust our seeds to the earth. 
 What is the "earth?" The earth or soil is 
 disintegrated primitive rock (gneiss, granite, 
 porphyry). The soil of our fields is con- 
 tinually being increased by the disintegra- 
 tion of primitive rocks, and from this there 
 grow up grasses, herbs, shrubs and trees; 
 without mineral constituents no plant can 
 grow. Now, when in level plains the upper 
 layer of the soil through long cultivation 
 
98 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 has become exhausted of certain necessary 
 mineral constituents new rocky material 
 must be provided, from which nothing has 
 as yet been grown, which, therefore, still 
 contains all its strength ; this is not only the 
 most natural, but also the simplest and at the 
 same time the cheapest way to increase and 
 maintain the yield of our fields. This is not 
 mere theory, thought out in the study; but 
 experience and success have demonstrated it. 
 With Hensel there is no more need for ex- 
 periments, but merely of demonstration. A 
 firm in the Rheuish Palatinate has produced 
 a variety of fertilizers, according to his direc- 
 tions, out of pulverized rocks, such as are 
 most suitable for the various plants. I will 
 here only mention fertilizers for vineyards, 
 meadows and potato fields. Hundreds of 
 advocates affirm the favorable results of 
 these_ fertilizers. The rest should be read 
 in the pamphlet itself. 
 
 Since the spring of 1890 I have used stone- 
 meal manure in my garden, situated on our 
 well-known sandy soil, and am extraordi- 
 narily well pleased with the result. I have, 
 e. g., picked from a row of raspberry bushes 
 about twenty-three yards long fifty quarts 
 of the most delicious fruit, some of over one 
 inch in length and three-fourths of an inch 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 99 
 
 in diameter. The shoots of this year, which 
 will bear next year, are as thick as a finger, 
 some as thick as a thumb, and up to eight 
 feet high. The young fruit trees planted 
 about three years ago are bearing very well, 
 and what is well to notice they are set 
 abundantly with buds for blossoming next 
 year. What is especially surprising is that 
 I have found no worms at all neither in 
 my raspberries nor my early pears and 
 apples; the winter apples also have so far 
 not shown a single worm-eaten fruit. My 
 vegetables I sowed in furrows, covering first 
 with mineral manure and leveling the fur- 
 row with earth. The plants I took out to 
 transplant have a mass of roots such as I 
 have never seen even in a manure bed. 
 They, therefore, were easily transplanted ; 
 none withered. I will not mention my 
 asparagus because the variety used (Hor- 
 burger Riesenspargel) of itself brings great 
 shoots. I have cut asparagus weighing six 
 to nine ounces; they were a foot long and 
 their circumference at the middle of their 
 length was four and one half inches; the 
 taste of this asparagus is excellent. I would 
 especially point to the quality, the most de- 
 licious savor of fruits, etc., grown with 
 this manure in contradistinction to those 
 
100 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 grown with stable manure; this is also shown 
 in the pamphlet mentioned above. With 
 all these advantages mineral manure is even 
 cheaper than all other artificial manures. 
 " We need no artificial manure if we suppty 
 that which we annually draw from the soil 
 in form of fruits, etc., by means of fresh, un- 
 exhausted pulverized granite, gneiss or 
 porphyry as the genuine strengthening and 
 primitive fertilizer, mixed with gypsum and 
 lime." 
 
 How the fungus of the grape-vine, the 
 Odium Tuckeri, is to be removed and how 
 even the phylloxera can be extirpated and, 
 according to Hensel's statements, has been 
 extirpated, may be seen in " Das Leben," p. 
 478. 
 
 The fallacy of the supposition hitherto 
 held that all cultivated plants must have 
 especially nitrogenous food in order that 
 they may prosper becomes more and 
 more apparent. By experiments it has 
 been indubitably proved, and Hensel al- 
 ways asserted, that plants, and especially 
 the leafy, leguminous fodder plants (clover, 
 vetches, etc.), can take up and elaborate 
 nitrogen through their leaves out of 
 the air just as the carbonic acid taken 
 up from the air is worked up into hydro- 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 101 
 
 carbons under the operation of light. All 
 we need, therefore, is to furnish the soil with 
 the necessary mineral constituents. Mineral 
 manure is the most profitable, most lasting 
 and, what is not to be overlooked, an en- 
 tirely odorless fertilizer. 
 
 If I shall have succeeded in calling the at- 
 tention of the reader to the glorious effects 
 of this manure the object of these lines is 
 attained. When the use of this manure is 
 then followed by surprising results the 
 beautiful fruits will, in the most literal 
 sense, be my reward. 
 
 STONE FERTILIZING. 
 
 By Dr. Emil Schlegel, Pract. Physician in 
 Tubingen. 
 
 From the Wegweiser zur Gesundheit, Sept. 
 15, 1891. 
 
 This is a subject that does not immediately 
 concern the Wegweiser zur Gesundheit, but 
 which nevertheless on account of its far ex- 
 tended importance may have the greatest 
 effect on the well-being and wealth of our 
 people. The chemist, Julius Hensel, of 
 whom we have several times before this 
 spoken in earlier numbers of the Wegweiser, 
 
102 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 and who is known to its readers by his genial 
 book Das Leben, has lately published another 
 work which deserves particular mention. 
 He therein sets forth that the loss of soil in 
 mineral substances (lime, magnesia, etc.) is 
 not supplied by animal offal, though this 
 produces a strong forcing of the plants, 
 which makes the leaves and the products 
 weakly and injurious, as this is said to have 
 developed in the irrigated fields at Berlin, 
 where the bones and muscles of the animals 
 fed on their produce are suffering and also 
 the milk is not satisfactory for sucklings. 
 In a still higher degree these injurious forc- 
 ing substances are found in artificial 
 manures and especially in Chili nitre, caus- 
 ing a rapid, surprising^ luxurious growth; 
 but when the fruit or the seeds develop 
 there is a manifest falling off. Now, since 
 every year millions of dollars are transferred 
 from the pockets of the farmers into those of 
 manufacturers of artificial manures, and of 
 speculators and stock holders, this amounts 
 to an impoverishment of the soil by para- 
 sites. 
 
 The true cure of an exhausted soil consists, 
 according to Hensel, in supplying it with 
 comminuted rocks, especially granite, gneiss, 
 porphyry and lime. Thereby the plants 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 103 
 
 receive again what they naturally demand. 
 The Wegweiser would here remark that the 
 best proof of these views given on a great 
 scale is thousands of years old; i. e., the 
 fertility of Egypt. The mud of the Nile 
 consists almost exclusively of finely com- 
 minuted rocks, with very, very few organic 
 nitrogenous constituents. But the flooded 
 districts owe their unexampled fertility to 
 just this precipitated stone dust. Hensel 
 writes at the end of his book : 
 
 "Almost every field contains stones which 
 have only been acted upon in part by the 
 dissolving moisture of the soil, and which 
 therefore shows a more or less rounded 
 form. These stones, as they injure the spade 
 or plow, are usually removed to the sides of 
 the fields and there heaped up, and are then 
 sold at a cheap rate for use on the highways. 
 The farmer who acts thus sells his birth- 
 right, so to say, for less than a pottage of 
 lentils, for he removes the source of fertility 
 from Iiis fields. If such stones are heated in 
 the stove or on the hearth for half an hour 
 and then thrown into water they become so 
 friable that they may be broken into small 
 pieces by the hands and may easily be 
 pulverized with a hammer." It is to be 
 
104 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 wished that these developments of Hensel 
 should find a wide diffusion. 
 
 LETTER TO MR. SCHMITT. 
 
 Oranienburg, Aug. 17, 1893. 
 Highly Honored Sir : 
 
 I have just safely returned from my long 
 tour for the stone-dust, having been away 
 five weeks, and I herewith give you a brief 
 report, so that you may also enjoy the vic- 
 tory which stone-dust has gained wherever 
 it has been really put to a practical test. 
 
 I have already written to you of the emi- 
 nent, happy effects of stone-dust on the 
 estates of Count Chamare. I have been able 
 to see its good effects also in Upper Silesia, 
 and have established there two more stations 
 for the future, where normal trials will be 
 made. I saw exceedingly significant results 
 from stone-dust on the field of Chief Bailiff 
 Bonner at Culmsee, in West Preussen ; i, e., 
 excellent wheat, sowed after barley and oats, 
 with only five cwt. of stone-dust to the acre; 
 also splendid rye in fourth succession on 
 five cwt. of stone-dust, and sugar beets fol- 
 lowing sugar beets on merely six and a-half 
 cwt. to the acre, which promise a very good 
 yield. Here it was found that the fields 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 105 
 
 needed above all a good supply of lime, and 
 this lime was the best support to the happy 
 effects of the stone-dust. On this account 
 the cultivation of the field with stone meal 
 demanded a simultaneous application of 
 lime of sixteen to thirty cwt. per acre. 
 
 So great a quantity will not be used in one 
 year. For the stone-meal made according to 
 Hensel's directions contains as much lime 
 and magnesia as the average crops call for. 
 
 The cultivation of sugar beets can be 
 doubled by stone-meal. This accomplish- 
 ment would surely be a great result from 
 stone-meal. Also in West Preussen I have 
 established an experimental station for the 
 proper use of stone-meal on a large estate 
 near Braunsberg, belonging to a Herr von 
 Bestroff. This gentleman called on me for 
 this purpose also before this in Oranien- 
 burg. 
 
 I hope that this, my first tour in behalf of 
 stone-meal, has not been in vain, and I in- 
 tend, God willing, to repeat these tours 
 annually, so as to benefit our great and 
 important cause with all my strength. I am 
 quite confident that stone-dust combined in 
 the proper way with lime will by its prac- 
 tical success carry off the victory. 
 
 I shall do my best to carry out the stone- 
 
106 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 meal experiments on the estates of Count 
 Ghamare in the most conscientious manner, 
 and hope that God's blessing may rest on 
 this my labor, which I perform gladly for 
 my country. 
 
 Otto Sctioenfeld, 
 Director of the Agricultural and Forestry 
 School. 
 
 TO THE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY "HEIM- 
 GARTEN IN BUELACH.' 1 
 
 Letter by Mr. K. Utermohlen, Teacher in 
 Leinde. 
 
 By means of the stone-meal manure of Hen- 
 sel we shall soon surpass all similar under" 
 takings (co-operative Pomological Associa- 
 tion). If the tree has a sufficiency of this 
 primitive substance under its roots it is not 
 only fruitful, but no more sensitive as to 
 frost and diseases. Nor will it be infested 
 as much by insects, as it will be healthy, 
 having a pure sap. With the usual treat- 
 ment with manure rich in nitrogen the trees 
 are satiated to repletion, and then it is with 
 them as with men. Their fibres are relaxed, 
 their sap is checked, diseases developed, lice 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 107 
 
 and other vermin infest them, and then we 
 have to sprinkle them with mixtures, cut 
 out wounds, put on wax and pitch, etc. By 
 well preparing the soil with this mineral 
 manure we prevent all these troubles from 
 the start, the trees become strongman d hard- 
 ened. It is just as when parents bring up 
 healthy children with solid food. They then 
 have none of these troubles and cares en- 
 countered by parents who treat their chil- 
 dren perversely. 
 
 For the last two years I have been making 
 various experiments with stone-meal manure, 
 and indeed with the different kinds. From 
 my experience with it I have come to the 
 firm conviction that we need no other 
 manure at all but this. I wish I could speak 
 with angels' tongues to make clear to you 
 its great importance for our cause. It would 
 carry me too far to speak of all the various 
 experiments. A radical reform in this direc- 
 tion will have to be made. If we give the 
 trees when they are first planted some of 
 this manure between their roots, with good 
 irrigation, they will be twice as strong and 
 vigorous as without it. We do not need 
 any stable manure to loosen the ground, 
 that is best effected by diligent hoeing and 
 digging. Where this should prove insuffi- 
 
108 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 cient we call in peat moss to our aid, and 
 this can be gotten cheap here. That is what 
 I did here with my heavy garden soil, and 
 then with the help of stone-meal I have 
 raised the finest vegetables, though the 
 garden has seen no stable manure for eight 
 years. And then how pleasant and cleanly 
 is this mineral manure when compared with 
 the smell of solid and liquid stable manure. 
 Then we should consider its great cheapness. 
 Much can be done with 1 cwt. If we had 
 always to use stable manure we would have 
 to give out great sums every year, and even 
 then we could not get a sufficient quantity. 
 But there must be manure, for "From noth- 
 ing nothing comes," as the saying is. In 
 this trouble the mineral manure is our best 
 help. We cannot in this matter give any 
 consideration to the authorities in horti- 
 culture, as they are in error with respect to 
 the nutrition of plants, I refer especially to 
 their silly theories about nitrogen. Who 
 brings to the strong oaks of one hundred 
 years growing on rocky soil, or to the other 
 lovely children of mother earth out in free 
 nature, liquid or solid manure or sewerage? 
 They grow and nourish and revel in their 
 healthy growth just because they are spared 
 all these. So it will be with our fruit trees 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 109 
 
 when we shall nourish them in .a natural 
 manner. It is not a mere secondary ques- 
 tion but a most fundamental one which is 
 here involved. The question is whether we 
 shall in the treatment of our little trees 
 follow the perverted and worn out routine 
 of the wisdom of the professors of our state 
 with their theories of albumen or whether 
 we will follow the path of nature. We have 
 chosen for ourselves and our mode of living 
 the latter course ; it is then surely proper to 
 do the same with respect to our plantations. 
 If I only had a photographic apparatus I 
 should like to send you a picture of some of 
 our standard trees and some of our half- 
 standards, so that you could convince your- 
 self with your own eyes of the excellent ef- 
 fects of this wonderful fertilizer. This is 
 especially the case with a four-year-old half- 
 standard to which I have specially applied 
 this manure. Such a multitude of the finest 
 russets ! It would hardly be thought possible 
 in a little tree of four years. And then you 
 should see how this little fellow has in- 
 creased in thickness! His coat has almost 
 become too narrow for him. The apples 
 hang twice as thick as in other years, and 
 their flavor can hardly be recognized ; their 
 aroma is really refreshing. The same I have 
 
110 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 perceived this year in our cherries and rasp- 
 berries. When I come to see you I shall 
 bring a whole selection of apples for trial. I 
 well manured a bed of several square yards 
 of ground and planted it with cucumbers. 
 
 After gathering this summer a whole 
 basket full I thought I had a remarkably 
 good crop; but now the bed is just as full 
 again, although I have picked some from 
 time to time. The same is the case with the 
 beans and onions which I have noticed par- 
 ticularly, as we can only plant flat-rooted 
 vegetables between the trees. 
 
 We cannot sufficiently express our satis- 
 faction that we have in this manner not only 
 found a substitute for, but something far 
 better than stable manure. 
 
 THE STONE-MEAL OF DR. HENSEL BEFORE 
 THE COMMITTEE ON FERTILIZERS 
 OF THE GERMAN AGRI- 
 CULTURAL SOCIETY. 
 
 (From Dr. F. Schaper, in Nauen, in the " Ostlia- 
 vellaendisches Kreisblatt.") 
 
 "Most of the members evidently knew 
 nothing about the mineral manure save 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. Ill 
 
 through the abuse of the well-known Pro- 
 fessor Wagner, in Darmstadt. It is a sad 
 state of affairs, but it is true, that these insti- 
 tutions, founded for the use of agriculture, 
 cannot act freely, but have to regard quite' 
 different groups of interest; i. e., those of 
 the manufacturers of manure. That their 
 interests and those of the farmers are 
 directly opposed to each other is manifest 
 from this that farmers desire cheap fertil- 
 izers but the manufacturers of manure de- 
 sire to keep them as high as possible in 
 order that they may make the more money. 
 Now the agricultural trial stations receive 
 part of their support from the manufacturers 
 of manures, as they are paid for their control- 
 analyses, experiments, etc. In order that they 
 may not lose these contributions these institu- 
 tions must avoid whatever runs counter to 
 the interests of their employers. It is often 
 even stipulated in the contracts between the 
 manufacturers of fertilizers and the agri- 
 cultural trial stations that they should 
 obligate themselves to protect these factories 
 of artiQcial manures from unfair competi- 
 tion. 
 
 But who is to decide who and what be- 
 longs to " unfair competition? " The manu- 
 facturer will be apt to consider every one as 
 
112 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 an " unfair competitor " who threatens to 
 diminish his profits, and he will therefore in- 
 sist, and a certain plausibility cannot be 
 denied to their demands, that the agricult- 
 ural stations according to their contract 
 should in every case work for them. This 
 enables us to explain the silence or the open 
 hostility of the agricultural trial stations 
 as to stone-meal manure. No intelligent 
 man will on this account consider this hostil- 
 ity of importance or take too serious view of 
 it. 
 
 This opposition should even be of use to 
 the cause, since no truth valuable in itself 
 can be injured by the exercise of a criticism 
 ever so sharp, if this is done in a scientific 
 manner. But such an objective criticism 
 has not been exercised on Hensel's theory,^ 
 but certain directors of trial stations, instead 
 of combatting it in a scientific manner, have 
 descended to gross abuse and have, there- 
 fore, been judicially punished. 
 
 Mr. Shulz-Lupitz, the chairman of the 
 Committee on Fertilizers, objects to Mr. 
 Hensel, in the session of 14 February of this 
 year (1893), that he is conducting his cause 
 against acknowledged men of science in a 
 rough manner, and that this could not be 
 rebuked sufficiently — a peculiar objection as 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 113 
 
 coming from a man who, so far as the direc- 
 tion of the proceedings and the form of the 
 resolution offered by him and finally ac- 
 cepted go to show, has only a slight regard 
 for the whitewashed politeness of Europe. 
 He has, we are sorry to see, forgotten that 
 Mr. Hensel was not the attacking party, but 
 quite a different set of people, the close 
 friends of Mr. Shulz-Lupitz, and the aim of 
 the proceedings was evidently to get them 
 out of the scrape into which their own pre- 
 cipitation had brought them. The well- 
 known professor, Dr. Wagner, in Darmstadt, 
 director of the agricultural trial station 
 there, in his edict in the year 1889 had called 
 the mineral manure a gross swindle and 
 denied to it any value. This edict had been 
 published by Ziminer's factory in Mannheim 
 in innumerable pamphlets and in journals 
 as a supplement. Thus it came that in far 
 extended agricultural circles which only 
 heard of mineral manure through journals 
 of Wagnerian tendency Mr. Hensel was ac- 
 counted a charletan. When a man like Mr. 
 Hensel who thinks he has discovered some- 
 thing useful for agriculture is thus shame- 
 fully reviled, and in the end deals with his 
 assailants in a somewhat doughty fashion, 
 who will account him reprehensible? Now 
 8 
 
ll-i BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 Mr. Schulz-Lupitz in the proceedings con- 
 tinues this kind of polemics against Mr. 
 Hensel. 
 
 The resolution passed declares in its first 
 part: " HenseVs stone-meal is from the stand- 
 point of practical and scientific knowledge 
 to be designated a worthless fertilizing 
 agent." Just the contrary is the truth. 
 From the standpoint of practical experience 
 the stone-meal has shown itself a valuable 
 fertilizer; surely enough, the men who had 
 some practical experience in the manure 
 were not acknowledged by these gentlemen 
 of the manure division but they were pre- 
 sented by some learned men of this assembly 
 (Latin economists Uncle Braessig would 
 probabty call them) conscious of their infalli- 
 ble book learning, as men who could easily 
 be cheated, and who now also cheat others, 
 thus as cheating and cheated. 
 
 These learned gentlemen seem to forget 
 that in practical life a grain of common 
 sense outweighs a hundred weight of book- 
 learning, as the shepherd of the Abbot of St. 
 Gall said long ago. 
 
 In the second part of its resolution the 
 manure division rebukes the "impertinent 
 bearing" of the "so-called chemist" Hensel 
 with indignation and "expresses to Mr. 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 115 
 
 Professor Wagner, in Darmstadt, the thanks 
 of the practical agriculturists for his appro- 
 priate designation of the stone-meal of Hen- 
 sel. This latter gentleman had called it as 
 above mentioned, a gross swindle." The 
 manure division has cautiously avoided us- 
 ing this expression. For this expression 
 has caused the punishment of two editors 
 who had copied the Wagnerian production 
 and its author. Professor Wagner has 
 escaped a probable judicial condemnation 
 only by the fact that the complaint owing 
 to an oversight fell under the statute of 
 limitation. 
 
 We who are convinced of the value of 
 Hensel's method of improving the soil look 
 trustingly into the future, with the convic- 
 tion that truth has always made its way if 
 it only found courageous and intelligent 
 champions. 
 
 I would, therefore, request all who have 
 had any practical experience with the stone- 
 meal to publish their experiences for the 
 good of the cause and of their fellowmen, 
 and not to leave the field to the sole occu- 
 pancy of the opponents. The word of the 
 single man easily dies away, the multitude 
 only makes the full chorus, especially in our 
 democratic times, and this chorus alone can 
 
116 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 hush the short-sighted insolence and the 
 self-interests which oppose the new discovery. 
 
 ABOUT STONE-MEAL MANURE. 
 
 {Land und Hauswirthschaftliclie-Rundschaii) 
 No. 11, 1893. 
 
 A short time ago we published an article 
 on the experiments with the new stone-meal 
 fertilizer; we also gave space to an objective 
 presentation as to the causes which make 
 stone-meal suitable for a manure. The new 
 fertilizer and its discoverer have suffered 
 severe infestations. It may, therefore, in- 
 terest our readers to see a report from our 
 neighborhood as to some trials made of it. 
 We have received the following: 
 
 Sometime ago a burgomaster of the neigh- 
 hood called our attention to the splendid 
 stand of grain manured with stone-meal on 
 the " Stenheimer Hof,' 1 on the estates of the 
 Grand Duke of Luxemburg. A company of 
 gentlemen who take an earnest interest in 
 this matter (chemist, Dr. Ebel, teacher 
 Eeisenkopf, and the landed proprietor, Loeil- 
 lot de Mars, from Wiesbaden ; Director Spiet- 
 hoff, editor of the Pionier, from Berlin ; Mr. 
 Forke, of Eltville, and Dr. Dietrich and Dr. 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 117 
 
 Brockhues, from Oberwallauf) in a Whit- 
 suntide excursion verified these statements 
 beyond all expectations. In spite of the 
 great drouth the rye on 18J acres of ground 
 had stout stalks and long thick ears, and 
 the tenant, Mr. Heil, told us that little more 
 than 5 cwt. to the acre, altogether 100 cwt., 
 had been used. Just as luxuriant with dark 
 green stalks and leaves stood the oats, 1^ 
 acres, right by the highway. This piece of 
 ground had not had any stable manure for 
 many years, and had only received 20 cwt. 
 of stone-meal with an addition of 6 cwt. of 
 iron slag. The comparison with neighbor- 
 ing fields which had been well cultivated 
 but differently manured, was very much 
 in favor of the manuring with stone-meal. 
 Just as striking as was the success of Mr. 
 Forke on his rye, oats and clover, it was on his 
 fruit trees and grape vines. We would only 
 mention that a clover field of which one- 
 half had been manured with stable manure 
 and the other half with stone-meal showed 
 a dense growth of clover on the latter half, 
 while the former half showed many weeds 
 but hardly any clover. A cherry tree and 
 a tree with Gravenstine apples, which for 
 many years had yielded no fruit worth speak- 
 ing of, this year, after having. been well sup- 
 
118 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 plied with stone-meal, are covered over and 
 over with fruit. 
 
 A neighboring farmer told him, on seeing 
 his fine oats, " Here we can see clearly how 
 your manure acts ; it could not stand better 
 if you had put on 60 cartloads of stable 
 manure per acre, which would have cost 
 $125.00 to $150.00 per acre. 
 
 The condition of the grape-vines after 
 repeated manuring with stone-meal was on 
 comparison with other grape-vines found to 
 be excellent, but we shall return to particu- 
 lars, as with the rye and oats, at the time of 
 harvest. We invite the farmers of the 
 neighborhood to make their comparisons 
 and to convince themselves of the solid 
 results of manuring with stone-meal. This 
 possesses the quality of vigorously nourishing 
 the plants and making them strong to resist 
 frosts and drouth. The above-mentioned 
 gentlemen will bear record as to whether 
 Hensel is really the " false prophet" that 
 he has been represented to be. 
 
 To Director Spiethoff this investigating 
 committee, in which he took part, was the 
 more wished for, as the Pionier had first 
 called attention to the scientist Hensel, and 
 had also been the first to communicate last 
 year the astonishing results in the Agricul- 
 tural School of Oranienburg. 
 
BREAD FROM STOKES. 119 
 
 WHAT HELP CAN BE GIVEN TO THE HARD- 
 PRESSED FARMERS. 
 
 (Badischer Volksbote, July 1, 1893.) 
 This question is the most important in our 
 national affliction of drouth, and the lack of 
 pasturage connected therewith, that can oc- 
 cupy any true friend of his country. And 
 this question is not answered by old party 
 catchwords of protective tariff and free 
 trade and monopoly ; it will neither be 
 solved in the Reichstag nor in the local leg- 
 islature, though legislation is also in this 
 matter an important factor. The farmer 
 alone can decide here; in his hand lies the 
 future of our people. The matter at stake 
 is the most valuable possession a people can 
 have, their native land and soil. These are 
 faring ill. Our land is not only being more 
 heavily encumbered with mortgages every , 
 year, but is also losing some of its good 
 qualities and fertility, and as the debt in- 
 creases the value decreases. This is the 
 most threatening complication we have to 
 meet. But there is no use in merely lament- 
 ing i]b, it must be improved and amended. 
 And it can be improved if we will only open 
 
120 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 our eyes and see and learn and act in ac- 
 cordance with that which we learn. 
 
 We can improve the soil and make it 
 fertile by using stone-meal as a fertilizer, as 
 is shown by the experience of many practi- 
 cal farmers. In the " Nenes Mannheimer 
 Volksblatt," M. A. Heilig publishes the fol- 
 lowing declaration : 
 
 "The Landwirthschaftliche Blaetter," by 
 Mr. Councillor Nessler, in Karlsruhe, re- 
 jected a few months ago Hensel's method of 
 mineral manuring. Whoever wants to 
 convince himself how Hensel's method acts 
 in practice is invited to inspect my two and 
 one-half acres of barley near the Isolating 
 Hospital. Despite of the unusual drouth 
 the barley has attained an unusual height, 
 and stands much fresher than the barley in 
 other fields. After the harvest I shall have 
 the yield determined before witnesses to see 
 the difference also in this respect." 
 
 When practical experiments show such 
 results the farmer ought to give up his old 
 prejudices and try himself whether the new 
 method of manuring is not better than the 
 old. That the scientists and professors 
 ignore the new source of fertilizing need 
 not astonish us, on the contrary: "The pro- 
 fessors are opposed to it, therefore it is 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 121 
 
 good," may soon become a proverb, for 
 hitherto the professors have always opposed 
 everything good at its first appearance. AVe 
 think Hensel's method of manuring will 
 likely make agriculture again profitable, 
 and we shall recommend it even if all shoud 
 oppose us on this account. When at some 
 future date, not too far removed, the German 
 farmer and through him all the German 
 people shall enjoy the blessings of this im- 
 provement of the soil we shall yet receive 
 thanks that we helped to prepare the path 
 for this new good during its hard times. 
 
 FROM THE "RHEINISCHER COURIER," 
 WIESBADEN, JUNE 6, 1893. 
 We have received the following communi- 
 cation: "In No. 152 of your valued journal, 
 among the 'Agricultural Communications/ 
 is a short, but favorable notice, from the 
 Manure-Division of the 'German Agricult- 
 ural Society,' concerning stone-meal. With 
 respect to this, permit me to invite you and 
 every one interested to examine the fields 
 and vineyards of my friend Franz Brodt- 
 mann here, as also the rye fields of Mr. Heil, 
 the tenant farmer at Hof-Steinheim, on the 
 
122 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 estates of the Grand Duke of Luxemburg, 
 which had been manured with this material 
 according to my directions, and they will be 
 convinced that contrary to these views 
 stone-meal is a most important fertilizer of 
 the very best quality, which when rightly 
 used yields the best results. 
 
 Respectfully, 
 
 L. FORKE. 
 
 Eltville, June 4, 1893. 
 
 FROM THE REINISCHER COURIER, JUNE 
 29, 1893. 
 
 Communication No. 175 of your morning 
 edition of June 26 contains an attack on 
 stone-meal as a manure, and an exaltation of 
 the present method of manuring with potassa, 
 nitrogen and phosphoric acid. I was for 
 many years an adherent of this latter 
 method, but I have become convinced by ex- 
 perience and practical trials that these arti- 
 ficial manures serve indeed to force the 
 growth and may be used with effect for 
 several years, but that they do not restore 
 to the soil what we withdraw from it in cul- 
 tivation. Therefore the state of our soil un- 
 avoidably deteriorates from year to year. 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 123 
 
 and at last refuses its service. Nobody 
 can stand partridges every day, but lie can 
 his daity bread, and so it is with all plants, 
 which not only need potassa, nitrogen and 
 phosphoric acid for their nourishment, but 
 in addition soda, lime, magnesia, sulphuric 
 acid, silicic acid, chlorine, iron, fluorine, car- 
 bonic acid, etc. All these elements are 
 found in many rocks in greater or smaller 
 quantities, and Hensel cannot be sufficiently 
 thanked that he has pointed out to us farmers 
 these inexhaustible supplies. When we re- 
 turn stone-meal to the soil we restore to it 
 all that was in the soil from the beginning, 
 and that our early ancestors did well with 
 the original material is manifest as stable 
 manure has only been used for about two 
 hundred years, and so-called artificial manure 
 only about fifty years. Of course we cannot 
 force matters with stone-meal ; but if it 4s 
 brought on the fields in autumn and plowed 
 under we may count on success as may 
 clearly be seen here and as I have already 
 stated in No. 155 of your much valued paper. 
 With all esteem for science, we farmers 
 cannot be contented with simply finding out 
 how much potash, nitrogen and phosphoric 
 acid the artificial fertilizers contain and 
 how much every per cent, thereof costs, we 
 
124 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 must rather strive to raise good crops on our 
 fields with slight expense, without at the 
 same time causing our soil to deteriorate by 
 a one sided system of fertilizing, and this is 
 certainly done when we only apply potassa, 
 nitrogen and phosphoric acid. 
 
 L. Forke. 
 EUville, June 27, 1893. 
 
 FROM THE « NETJES MANNHEIMER VOLKS- 
 BLATT," JULY 19, 1893. 
 
 That the much-abused stone-meal cannot 
 be without its excellent points the results in 
 the fields best show. Mr. Kircher here has 
 raised on various fields manured with this 
 material barley and wheat, which must ab- 
 solutely convince even the most skeptical of 
 the usefulness of this manure. First, not 
 only are the stalks considerably higher and 
 stronger than those from fields manured 
 with other material, but the ears are on the 
 average one-third longer and the grains con- 
 siderably more perfect. (Mr. Kircher has 
 left in the editorial room of the "K M. V." 
 several wheat ears and barley ears from his 
 fields to show the difference, also some from 
 neighboring fields which have not been 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 125 
 
 manured with HenseFs fertilizer. Whoever 
 is interested in this matter, and every farmer 
 should be so, may inspect the ears in our 
 office.) 
 
 IRON SLAG. 
 
 (Koelnische Volkszeitung, April, 1893, No. 
 234, First Sheet.) 
 
 The supplement of the Thucringer Land- 
 boten brings a noteworthy article by the 
 practical farmer, A. Armstadt, under the 
 heading: "The Future of the Iron Slag." 
 The author first notes that iron slag has 
 risen to be the most generally used fertilizer 
 containing phosphoric acid only in conse- 
 quence of an immense amount of advertising, 
 but now it seems to be about to lose much 
 of its reputation. Even the German Agri- 
 cultural Society will earnestly declare 
 against it in its next publication. "I my- 
 self," says A. Armstadt, "have never been 
 enabled to feel any enthusiasm for iron slag 
 in consequence of my experiments with it, 
 and I have frequently on varions occasions 
 declared this, and it is a satisfaction to me 
 that numerous reports are now appearing 
 which confirm my observations. First of all, 
 
126 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 the fact that people come to doubt the 
 theor}' of a gradual enrichment of the soil 
 thereby will cause it to lose credit. Men of 
 science, as is well known, gave out the 
 notion that the soil must gradually be en- 
 riched with phosphoric acid in order that 
 rich crops may be raised. Iron slag was 
 said to be the most suitable for this purpose, 
 not only because the phosphoric acid in it is 
 cheapest, but also because phosphoric acid 
 in this form would in time become more 
 soluble. But most farmers have waited 
 probably in vain for the after effects. I 
 myself have never found any after effects. 
 According to the latest experiments, it is not 
 only probable but pretty well established 
 that every enrichment of the soil with phos- 
 phoric acid in mineral form is a waste, for it 
 passes into a form difficult of solution, so 
 that it cannot any longer be taken up by 
 plants. Prof. Dr. Liebscher (Goettingen) 
 even found that with a manuring of 100 cwt. 
 of iron slag to three-fifths of an acre no after 
 effects developed, though he waited for it 
 for seven years. But the copious applica- 
 tions of iron slag are founded on this theory 
 of enrichment only. 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 127 
 
 "NEUES MANNHEIMER VOLKSBLATT," 
 AUGUST 3, 1893. 
 
 With a few potted plants or a small piece 
 of garden any one can make a trial of the 
 value or worthlessness of Hensel's teachings, 
 and no more paper need be wasted in their 
 justification. An increasing number of 
 farmers are experimenting successfully with 
 the new fertilizer and it will gradually but 
 surely supersede the old. The old manures 
 supplied plants with too much forcing 
 material and too much phosphoric acid, a 
 substance which surely causes plant-lice, 
 caterpillars, snails and the like. The stone- 
 meal improves the nutrition of the plants 
 without forcing them, so that while their 
 growth is slower their leaves have a lesser 
 amount of water, the fruits and stalks a 
 greater amount of lime and are more whole- 
 some and nourishing. As the fruits mature 
 the phosphorus passes mostly into the seeds 
 and the silica into the leaves and stalks. 
 When agriculture hitherto built its theory 
 of manuring on the ashy constituents of the 
 seeds with their high contents of phos- 
 phorus it did not consider that the whole 
 
128 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 growing plant before the separating process 
 during ripening requires quite different 
 proportions of admixture than what may be 
 derived from the seeds alone. A comparison 
 of Hensel's views on this domain with the 
 question of human nutrition rises very 
 naturally. Exhausted men also are favored 
 with allowing them to eat heartily of the 
 convenient meat, with eggs and milk, all 
 nutriments fully prepared for assimilation. 
 The consequence is an excitation and irrita- 
 tion of the whole organism, bad digestion, 
 increased watery contents of the body, per- 
 spiration, thirst, exhaustion from slight 
 exertions, debility. A strong manuring 
 with predominantly animal offal is for 
 plants planted in a soil deficient in certain 
 minerals what a predominantly animal diet 
 is for men. If we look at men who live in 
 the country almost altogether on food diffi- 
 cult of assimilation, of bread, vegetables and 
 fruit, we observe a far more quiet bodily 
 activity, little perspiration, little thirst, 
 great and continuous muscular power. It is 
 similar with plants when we offer them 
 again their original nutriments, direct them 
 to the appropriation of mineral constitu- 
 ents and give them organic manures or 
 nitrogen only in small quantities and as a 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 129 
 
 secondary matter. In both cases the con- 
 stitution will be more normal, freer from 
 parasites (diseases). If we notice in agri- 
 cultural journals the enormous expenditures 
 for advertising artificial manures it may be 
 known what a gain these factories yield, 
 and the mind grows sad at the wealth with- 
 drawn from German farmers, who even 
 without this are so hard pressed. 
 
 Dr. E. Schlegel, 
 Pract. Physician, Tuebingen. 
 
 (WIESBADENER GENERAL ANZEIGER, 
 JULY 8, 1893.) 
 For diminishing the distress as to fodder, 
 we do not need as the troubled farmer is ad- 
 vised in another journal, to use artificial 
 manure: superphosphate and Chili-nitre or 
 superphosphate of nitrate of potassa for the 
 meadows ; superphosphate of nitre with acid 
 phosphate or with phosphate of lime for the 
 cloverfields ; fresh stable manure and liquid 
 manure, Chili-nitre, superphosphate of 
 potassa or superphosphate of nitre for In- 
 dian corn for the horses, etc. The pen and 
 compositors object to the twenty-fold repeti- 
 
130 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 tion of the wonderful compounded fertilizers. 
 We recommend for the meadows, ashes of 
 every kind, and for the root fields, street 
 dust, and in general for the future, mineral 
 manure, which is at the same time the best 
 protection against drouth and all the dis- 
 eases of plants, as it gives to plants the 
 power of "resistence and which in turn is 
 transferred to men and animals through 
 their food. That the diminution of the pres- 
 ent and also of any future distress as to 
 fodder may be effected by mineral manure 
 is demonstrated by the following experience : 
 For five years I have been using stone- 
 meal manure in my garden and fields. The 
 results alwa} r s have been satisfactory in 
 every respect, for the soil becomes better 
 every year by using this manure. Especially 
 this year during the extraordinary drouth, 
 the excellent effects of stone-meal fully 
 manifested themselves. The flower as well 
 as the different vegetables developed so 
 magnificiently that every one who passed my 
 garden stopped and admired the great 
 growth, especially of the Kohlrabi. In the 
 cabbage which I planted at the beginning of 
 April in my cow pasture, the rich crop is the 
 more astonishing as it was not watered dur- 
 ing the whole of its growth, this field 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. . 131 
 
 has received for five years only stone-meal 
 manure (no solid or liquid stable manure); 
 alongside of the cabbage field is the potato 
 patch and it shows a most luxurious growth 
 despite of the abnormal drouth. The above 
 experience has brought me to the firm 
 conviction that this fertilizer not only 
 improves and augments the cultivated soil, 
 but also keeps it moist and therefore pre- 
 vents the rapid drying up of plants during 
 a drouth. 
 
 Bernh. Wettengel, 
 Horticulturist and Truck Farmer. 
 Frankenthal, July 1, 1893. 
 
 For two years I have used stone-meal 
 manure with the greatest success, and es- 
 pecially this year, despite the extraordinary 
 drouth. The result has been magnificient; 
 the barley showed a much larger yield of 
 grain than ever before ; the potatoes were 
 very fine and to our astonishment remained 
 untouched by the heavy frosts, though others 
 that had received stable manure suffered 
 very severely. I was very much pleased 
 with the effects on oats and clover. Quite 
 astonishing also is the dark green, full leaved 
 appearance of the sugar beets, notwithstanding 
 
132 BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 the great continuous drouth. With the fruit 
 trees where I especially applied the new fer- 
 tilizer, I have fully learned how extra- 
 ordinarily it acts. I would therefore 
 urgently recommend every farmer to adopt 
 the new method. With the greatest satis- 
 faction I sign myself 
 
 Peter Heilmann, 
 
 Agriculturist. 
 Moersch, near Frankenthal, June 30, 1893. 
 
 In order to determine the results of the 
 new method of fertilizing, the undersigned 
 farmers and friends of agriculture assembled 
 on June 25, 1893, early in the morning at 7 
 o'clock sharp, for a common inspection of 
 the fields, and at this occasion we inspected 
 the following fields within the domain of 
 Frankenthal : 
 
 Names of fields. 
 
 Planted ivith 
 
 By the farmers. 
 
 Muklgewann, 
 
 Potatoes, 
 
 Carl Hei!mann, 1. 
 Conrad Bender, 
 
 New Gardens, 
 
 Barley, 
 
 widow. 
 
 Grosse Garkueche, 
 
 Barley, 
 
 Peter Huber, widow. 
 
 Grosse Garkueche, 
 
 Eye, 
 
 Adam Mack, 1. 
 
 Rokrlache, 
 
 Barley, 
 
 Daniel Sckerr. 
 
 Kleiner Wald, 
 
 Barley, 
 
 Valt. Zimmermann. 
 
 Kukweide, 
 
 Potatoes and BernkardWettengel. 
 
 
 cabbage, 
 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 
 
 133 
 
 Schiesshaus, 
 Actien-Eiskeller, 
 Gartengewann oh the 
 
 right hand og. Worni- 
 
 serstr, 
 Gartengewann on the 
 
 right hand og. Worm- 
 
 serstr, 
 Gartengewann on the 
 
 right hand og. Worm- 
 
 serstr, 
 Erhbestand, 
 Gartengewann on the 
 
 left of Wormserstr, 
 1 Mittelgewann, 
 Spiegel gewann, 
 Wingertsgewann, 
 Wi n gertsge wann , 
 
 Barley, 
 Potatoes, 
 
 The rifle club. 
 
 The stock company. 
 
 Barley, Clem. Wurmser. 
 
 Eye, 
 
 Barley, 
 Barley, 
 
 Barley, 
 Barley, 
 Barley, 
 
 Potatoes, 
 Potatoes, 
 
 Neuweide, 
 
 Neuweide, 
 
 Pfaftengewann, 
 
 Pfaffengewann, 
 
 Sugar-beets, 
 
 Sugar-beets, 
 
 Barley, 
 
 Potatoes, 
 
 Wilh. Schwarz. 
 
 Jah. Mees. 
 Hen. Grueming. 
 
 Phil. Schatz. 
 
 Joh. Bender, widow. 
 
 Valt. Zimmermann. 
 
 A. Geusheimer. 
 
 Jac. Armbrust, field- 
 guard. 
 
 Pet. Diehl, Beinder- 
 sheim. 
 
 Conr. Peters, Bein- 
 dersheim. 
 
 J. L. Braunsberg, 11. 
 
 Phil. Schatz. 
 
 Nearly all taking part in the inspection 
 were practical farmers, who are entirety 
 familiar with the local relations and quality 
 of the fields, The result of the inspection 
 ma} r well be called astonishing. 
 
 Though the summer has been abnormally 
 dry, all the barley inspected was distin- 
 guished by its dark green appearance when 
 compared with other fields not fertilized 
 
134 BREAD FROM STORES. 
 
 with stone-meal. The ears compared with 
 the others contained more rows. In a num- 
 ber of them we counted forty grains extra- 
 ordinarily fine and well developed. The 
 same conditions existed with the rye. The 
 potato fields showed a surprising luxuriant 
 stand. We must especially mention the 
 full leaved dark green appearance of the 
 sugar-beets, which encourages us to look for- 
 ward to a full development of the roots. 
 With the cabbage the rich crop is the more 
 surprising as it has not been watered during 
 the whole period of its growth. 
 
 The undersigned have taken part in this 
 general inspection with the more interest, as 
 they are convinced that the violent dispute 
 concerning the new method of manuring can 
 only be decided by practical success. This 
 was the reason why they desired to deter- 
 mine the numerous results obtained by a 
 general local survey made in the above men- 
 tioned way in a conscientous manner, and 
 they believe that they have thus ministered 
 to the common good. 
 
 Biendersheim : P. Diehl; Edigheim : H. 
 Jaeger, Jean Loosmann ; Flowersheim : G. 
 Garst, Ph. Sclireiber; Frankenthal: J. Arm- 
 brust, Fr. Bender, J. Fries, J. Fueschsle, K. 
 Gaschott, G. Kirchner, C. Luehle, H. Mayer, 
 
BREAD FROM STONES. 135 
 
 J. Mees, C. Moeller, C. Rupp, Ph. Scnatz, I). 
 Scherr, Fr. Scheuermann, G. Wettengel, Jon. 
 Zhnmermann ; Friesenheim : Ghr. Moellinger; 
 Moerscli: P. Heihnann ; Oppau : W. Glaus. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Albumen overestimated, 38. 
 
 Ammonia, 43. 
 
 Apples, 99, 109. 
 
 Apple trees made to bear, 117. 
 
 Artificial manures, cost of, 83. 
 
 Ashes of various plants, 73. 
 
 Asparagus, 99. 
 
 Bankruptcies of farmers, 91. 
 Barley, 120, 121. 
 
 Carpathian mountains, 77. 
 
 Cattle manure, effects on cattle, 32. 
 
 Cause of lice, etc., 127. 
 
 Chemical fertilizers a waste, 15. 
 
 Chemical process in the growth of plants, 59. 
 
 Chemists, a chapter for, 59. 
 
 Cherries, 110. 
 
 Chili-nitre, 20. 
 
 Chlorine, 22. 
 
 Clover, 117. 
 
 Cucumbers, 110. 
 
 Cure of exhausted soil, 102. 
 
 Dandelion, 24. 
 
 Decadence of agriculture, the cause of, 9. 
 
 Dolomite, 24. 
 
 Dr. Herman Fisher on stone-meal, 96. 
 
 Ears larger and grain more perfect, 124. 
 Effect of stable manure on men, 128. 
 
138 INDEX. 
 
 Egypt, 77, 103. 
 Enamel of teeth, 91. 
 Evil of liquid manure, 22. 
 
 Five years experience with stone-meal, 130. 
 
 Flax, 26. 
 
 Foot-rot in sheep, 37. 
 
 Fruit, 83. 
 
 Fruit trees, 109. 
 
 German Agricultural Society Committee. 110. 
 Grain from stone-meal, 116. 
 Grape vine and stone-meal, 118. 
 Granite rocks contain, 19. 
 
 Healthy crops, 19. 
 
 Healthy and unhealthy produce, 21. 
 
 Help to hard-pressed farmers, 119. 
 
 Holstein cattle, 36. 
 
 Horses mortality at cavalry barracks, 43. 
 
 Hungary, 77. 
 
 Hydro- carbon alone injurious, 47. 
 
 Injury to health from stable manure. 92. 
 Insect pest,-, 79. 
 
 Insects and fungous diseases. 57. 
 Iron slag, 125. 
 
 Law of minimum, 9. 
 
 Letter to Mr. Schmidt, 104. 
 
 Liebig's mistake, 74, 93. 
 
 Luxuriant growths that blind the eye. 58, 
 
 Marl, 28. 
 
 Meat diet and ill health, 35. 
 " Meat Powder," 34. 
 Mortality of children, 39. 
 
INDEX. 139 
 
 Murrain, 38. 
 
 Nile mud, 78, 103. 
 
 Nitrogen, mistake concerning it, 11. 
 
 Nitrogen unnessary, 47. 
 
 " No worms," 99. 
 
 Nutrition, influence on temperament, 27. 
 
 Oats, 117. 
 
 Oats for race horses, 27. 
 Opposition to stone meal, 112. 
 Ossified arteries, 26. 
 Oxalic acid, 61. 
 
 Peroxide of Hydrogen, 66. 
 
 Phyloxera, 79-81. 
 
 Phyloxera, how to extirpate, 100. 
 
 Pomological Society, 106. 
 
 Pork, 33. 
 
 Potash and Phosphoric acid, minimum, 11. 
 
 Potasia and soda in plant life, 23. 
 
 Potted plants, 127. 
 
 Primary rock contain, 19. 
 
 Raspberries, 98. 
 
 Results from stone meal, 133. • . 
 
 Rhine vineyards, 81. 
 
 Roses, 46. 
 
 Roses, the home of, 82. 
 
 Rye. 117. 
 
 Seaweed, 50. 
 Sewage and lice, 46. 
 Sheep and lime, 37. 
 Sign of the cancer, 13. 
 Silicic acid, 49. 
 Soil built up, 59. 
 
2 
 
 140 INDEX. 
 
 « 
 
 Stable manure not needed, 107. 
 
 " " what we shall do with, 39. 
 
 Stone fertilizing, by Dr. Schlegel, 101. 
 Stone-meal manure, 85. 
 
 " " and stable manure, 45. 
 k ' " amount to the acre, 55. 
 " " produces greater quantity and better 
 
 quality, 56. 
 " " on Luxumburg estate, 121. 
 '" " as a tobacco fertilizer, 69. 
 
 " making, 53. • 
 
 " " on estate of Count Chaman, 101. 
 " cleanly, 108. 
 " in drouth, 117-120. 
 Straw, ashes of, 74. 
 Strong food, poison food, 36. 
 Sugar, 61. 
 
 Teachers of agriculture, errors of, 13. 
 
 li Theorists in nutrition," 35. 
 
 Tobacco and stone-meal, 69. 
 
 Tobacco poor on account of stable manure, 70. 
 
 Tobacco, effect of fertilization on, 31. 
 
 To gain new soil, 21. 
 
 Trees and nitrogen, 14. 
 
 Two years' experience with stone-meal, 131. 
 
 Uruguay, 77. 
 
 Virginia tobacco, why it is better, 7. 
 
 " Where there is no manure nothing will grow," 89. 
 Will fertilizing with stone-meal pay V 48.