I have detailed this experiment at considerable length, not merely for the purpose of disproving what I conceive to be an erroneous opinion, but for the beneficial effect its disproof would have on careless farmers. Many who now raise from three to ten bushels of chess per acre would, if they did not believe this pernicious doctrine, soon raise as much wheat in its stead. It will take some time, as well as labor, to rid old farms of this unprofitable weed. But three years will more than repay both in the larger yield of wheat, and the better quality of flour.

Besides the facts which I have given, I will say a few words by way of argument of the question. The theory is contrary to nature. We do not find that other plants change. Then why should this? Different varieties of the same plant intermix; but the seed of one plant does not produce another distinct and altogether different from its parent plant. It is just as reasonable to suppose that chess will change to wheat; yet we never hear of such a change as that. If there are changes, why are they not mutual? Because the laws of God forbid it, which laws are written, not only in the works of nature around us, but also in the book of Revelation, which speaks thus: "The herb shall bear seed after its kind, and the fruit tree after its kind." Again: "Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?" And again: "A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit; neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit;" or, to change the terms, wheat cannot bring forth chess; neither can chess bring forth wheat.

Chess often grows in meadows, from which it has been supposed by some that timothy will also change. The one change is just as likely to take place as the other; but is it not most strange, apart from all other considerations, that two plants, so different as wheat and timothy, should each change regularly into another and the same plant? If the ground was clear, the notion that timothy changes would soon be exploded.

Chess is probably a hardier plant than wheat, and thus flourishes where wheat has been frozen out, or, from any other cause, has not grown well. It seems to commence its growth later in the spring, so that where the wheat is good, it is choked, and makes little show; but where the wheat has been injured, the small stalks spread into large stools, and produce abundantly. The same result follows where the seed sown has been partially picked up by birds, or left uncovered and perished.

Such a change is contradictory to all known chemical principles, and as inconsistent with reason as that a walnut tree should bear oranges, or a fig tree produce oysters.

Hon. THOMAS EWBANK,

Yours, respectfully,

Commissioner of Patents.

JOS. BRADY.

TRIPOLI IN ALABAMA.

TALLADEGA, ALABAMA.

SIR: Supposing it desirable that every resource of our great republic should be developed, I have thus intruded on you, for I do not know

whether mineralogy is embraced in the Patent Office Reports or not; but if it be an intrusion on your business, please pass it by, and impute it to ignorance. I have sent you a small specimen of what I suppose to be tripoli, hitherto unknown as a native of the United States--at least so far as I have learned. I have called it tripoli, though it may be some other mineral; for I do not profess to be well learned in mineralogy. It is called chalk by the common people, and used as such, and is found in a cave of what I suppose to be, in mineralogy, called mountain limestone. The geological character of this region is rather hard to be understood, but I believe its formation is what we call primitive, or plutonic, though not far from newer formations. This cave is situated in Talladega county, Alabama, one mile east of the Coosa river. A few miles west the coal fields set in, and continue in a western direction from fifty to one hundred miles. This coal formation is supposed to be immense, and is of good quality. Fifteen or twenty miles south there are immense quarries of fine white and variegated marble, and a quarry of lithographic stone, (very fine.) My limits will not admit of giving a mineralogical or geological history of this region; but it abounds in valuable minerals. There appears to be a large amount of this mineral, (which I call tripoli,) and it is easily quarried. Should it prove to be of good quality, we need not import it hereafter.

Very respectfully, yours, &c.,

The COMMISSIONER OF PATENTS.

JOHN HUBBARD.

SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, April 15, 1852.

DEAR SIR: The specimen of earth sent by John Hubbard, esq., of Talladega, Alabama, to the Office of Patents of the United States, has been submitted by me to a careful microscopic examination, and was found to be tripuli of the finest quality.

I am not aware of the quantity of tripoli imported yearly into the United States, but however small it be, if we have it in our country, let us make use of it; and if Alabama possesses extensive beds of that earth, it might be made of still more general use.

I remain, dear sir, yours, very truly,

THOS. EWBANK, Esq.,

C. GIRARD.

Commissioner of Patents.

AGRICULTURAL BUREAU.

The institution of an agricultural bureau by the general government has been a subject of public discussion for years, and is now (as it has repeatedly been) under the consideration of Congress. The legislatures of several States have passed resolutions in favor of its organization, and so have agricultural societies in various sections of the Union. Agricultural writers have inculcated its importance, and practical men have repeatedly urged the necessity of it in their communications to this Office.

Presidents Taylor and Fillmore have followed the example of Washington, in calling the attention of Congress to the subject. All that has been done towards carrying these views into effect is the employment of a temporary clerk in the Patent Office, whose salary, and the cost of purchasing and distributing seeds, &c., have been borne by the Patent Fund.

While some object to a bureau for the promotion of agriculture on constitutional grounds, and contend that every great industrial interest of the country has equal claims upon Congress, others are averse to its establishment from a belief, or fear, that it would become more or less subservient to political and party purposes. There is, however, an institution already organized by Congress to which no such objections can apply: it is national in its character, purposes, and location; it possesses. the requisite means and appliances--funds, buildings, a scientific corps, library and apparatus; and would seem, therefore, peculiarly adapted to prosecute one of the most important purposes of a bureau-a purpose in strict accordance with the will of its founder. The design of Smithson, as evinced by his employing the comprehensive and familiar term "knowledge"-not science-in his will, and by his selecting the most practical of all people as his trustees, was to add to and spread abroad the elements of material civilization-not solely to cultivate the higher or abstract sciences, for which philosophical associations abounded, and abound. With Franklin, he estimated science according to its practical value; and the sentiment is becoming more and more that of the enlightened world.

The propriety of establishing in the Smithsonian Institution a department of Agricultural, and one also of Mechanical science, with suitable appropriations, to aid in working out the great practical problems of the day, is respectfully suggested for the consideration of Congress. In this institution every citizen has an interest, and upon it a claim to all the information it can impart. To it might be referred the analysis of ores, soils, fertilizers, and vegetable products, together with propositions for the increase of speed in vehicles for traversing land and water, the application of electricity and the gases as motive agents, the extension of known materials to new manufactures, the evolution of new principles. and processes, and, in a word, for everything calculated to meet the progressive demands of agriculture and the arts. To it the Patent Office might be authorized to refer, for experimental proof, claims for patents involving doubtful points in chemistry and natural philosophy, &c.

By thus identifying itself with the active agents of modern progress, by taking up new and important problems in agricultural and mechanical science, and giving right directions for their solution, its benefits would be felt throughout the length and breadth of the land. It would increase and diffuse, not merely interesting information among savants, but substantial and fruitful knowledge" among men," and men of all climes; for it is idle to suppose that the discovery of any valuable fact in practical science can now be held for the exclusive benefit of one people: it would be rapidly proclaimed in every civilized section of the planet, and credit would be returned to the source whence it emanated.

The epoch of vegetable chemistry is but opening; yet it already offers a prospect than which one more varied and attractive never invited the attention of philosophers, or promised higher honors to discoverers. We

have as yet done but little in this prime department of research, although it is fraught with novel elements of national wealth and of national glory. Probably the greatest of human achievements for a century to come are to be made in it-greatest, as regards sublimity of discovery, and magnitude and beneficence of results.

The successful efforts of MM. Naudin and Lecoq in taming the hitherto intractable thistle family, and rendering them fit for human food, are examples of what is already being accomplished in this branch of research-one that will afford employment for the highest intellects, and reward the labors of enterprising agriculturists through all coming time.

"While M. Naudin hopes to produce a thornless thistle for the better nourishment of four-footed beasts, M. Lecoq places a thistle upon his own table and eats it himself, thorns and all. He entitles his letter read to the Academy, Two hundred, five hundred, or even a thousand new vegetables, ad libitum.' He had noticed the instinct of the ass invariably directing him to the thistle bed; and, confident that that serrated plant possessed some precious qualities that are not generally acknowledged, he took a few specimens of the tribe under his care, cultivated them carefully, and finally turned out a savory vegetable with thorns of the most inoffensive and flexible sort.' Continuing his experiments, he finally tamed every individual member of the fierce family of thistles-the Hercules thistles, Cirsium eriophorum, the Heracleum spondylum, and other redoubtable individuals. Encouraged by his success, he undertook the mollification of several tyrants of the vegetable kingdom more ferocious still, if possible, and encountered no serious resistance. In all this M. Lecoq claims no discovery, and conceals no secret. His only mode of transformation is to expose to the sun plants that grow in obscurity, and conceal from the solar influence plants that flourish in the open air, and thus entirely alter their nature. simply employs upon vegetable productions hitherto misunderstood and neglected the most common processes of the gardener's art. The acrid, aromatic properties of cress, parsley, chevoil, &c., are retained by allowing them to grow in the sun; the acridity of celery, on the contrary, is made to disappear by burying it in the sand; the crudity of certain sorts of lettuce is removed by binding the leaves tightly together, and excluding the light and the air. The entire nature of the plant is thus transformed; and it is by means as simple as these that M. Lecoq has made the thistle eatable, and holds out to us the hope of soon eating dock and pigweed with as much relish as asparagus and green peas. He asserts that by means of overturned flower-pots he can render alimentary all the cruciferous, all the umbelliferous, and all the syrantherous species, and that certain of the most despised and degraded among them will yet claim the place of honor at the festive board.

He

Inquiries into the forms and structure of coleoptera, algæ, &c., of antiquities, astronomy, language, ethnology, &c., are undoubtedly interesting, and ought to be pursued; but they are not incompatible with equally interesting and important researches into the organisms and means of improving esculent grains and grasses, fruits and roots, and the means of developing new plants for both food and materials of manufactures; nor need they exclude inquiries into the capabilities of domestic animals and their untamed relatives, since the progress of

society imperatively demands corresponding advances in all that relate to these essential agents and elements of civilization. Under the influence of ideas now nearly obsolete, savants once shrank from contact with popular processes and pursuits; but barren speculations are no longer preferred to fruitful realities, and the time has gone by when philosophy could not, without a sacrifice of her dignity, take up common things." A good example, in this respect, has already been furnished by the French republic of 1848, one of the first of whose acts was to found the "Institut Agronomique National" at Versailles. A part of the buildings of the palace, and about fifty acres of its grounds, were devoted to this object. A corps of the ablest professors in the country was formed; and superior instruction" in practical agriculture and chemistry is given. At the laboratory analyses of soils and manures are gratuitously made, and information is constantly imparted to those who may desire it. Among the professors, one is charged with the department of zootechnie, or everything relating to rearing and improving the breed of animals; another professor has the department of agriculture and mechanics; another that of ruled economy, or the exposition of such laws and principles of political economy as bear upon the functions of the farmer.

Then, as regards mechanical science, France has the "Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers," with its museum of models, and laboratory for analysis, where lectures on science applied to the arts, general information upon dye stuffs, metals, &c., &c., are gratuitously given.

So with us let the two grand industrial interests of our republic and of the world be in like manner directly represented in an institution founded for the benefit of mankind at large. Let our agriculturists have their Liebig, and our mechanics have their professors-men selected for their devotion to and extensive knowledge of the arts of industry— to whom they can resort for instruction and for advice in cases of diffi culty and doubt.

Of the facts and results obtained by the proposed departments in the Smithsonian Institution, those of immediate or permanent interest might be announced monthly or quarterly in cheap or gratuitous tracts, or they might be embodied in annual reports to Congress, and circulated like other public documents. The benefits emanating from the Institution would thus be greatly augmented, and would be brought more directly within the reach of the entire body of our people; nor could a more consistent employment of a part of the testator's bequest, or one more certain of public approval, be named. It would "increase and diffuse knowledge" among those who are best able and anxious to turn it to profitable account. Pre-eminently catholic in its character and design, there is nothing to prevent the Smithsonian from becoming one of the most cherished institutions of the age.

Respectfully submitted:

THOMAS EWBANK,

Commissioner of Patents.

[* See kindred sentiments well expressed by Professor Turner, of Illinois, in his “ Plan for the State University," copied in this Report, p. 37.]