Agraphia

( Pathol.) A form of cerebral disorder in which exists an inability to expre ideas by written symbols. It is a counterpart of APHASIA (q.v.) as regards speech. Agricultural Chemistry. The study of the chemistry of plants and soils, and of the chemical substances best adapted to produce fertility in the soil.-As plants contain from 40 to 90 per cent. of water, this is obviously the most e ential of all the elements of plant growth. Of the organic substances yielded by our staple crops, the most important are: the amyloids, compounds of carbon with hydrogen and oxygen in the proportions nece ary to form water,-viz., wood-fiber, starch, sugar, and gum; the pectoids, other compounds of the above elements, embracing pectose-the hard pulp of fruits and roots and other substances; the organic acids-oxalic, malic, citric, and tartaric; the albuminoids, including albumen, casein, fibrin, ., which contain carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen, with a small proportion of sulphur. In the ash of plants various other chemical substances appear, such as iron, sodium, calcium, phosphorus, silica, . Most of those substances are obtained from the soil. Water yields the requisite oxygen and hydrogen, the carbon is obtained by a reduction of the carbonic acid gas of the atmosphere, and nitrogen comes chiefly from the nitrates of the soil. Recent experiments on nitrification, by which free or elementary nitrogen existing in the soil is converted into nitric acid and thus made a imilable by plants, have yielded very important results. It is believed this action is caused by the action of bacteria in the soil, or in some cases by similar bacteria in the roots of plants. Only a small proportion of any soil is of use in the growth of plants, and experiment has shown that 140 lbs. of ash elements may be extracted from 1,000,000 lbs. of soil of which only 186 lbs. are soluble, and therefore in a condition to serve as plant food. But as those soluble materials are removed, other constituents of the soil are rendered soluble by material agencies, so that some degree of supply is constantly provided-largely, in some soils. But, for the large demands of agriculture, manures in some form are usually nece ary, to replace the ingredients removed from the soil by the growth of plants. Phosphates and a imilable nitrogen are the most nece ary of these. The former is usually the least abundant ingredient of soils, while the latter is rapidly removed by rain-water, and carried in great quantities into streams. The action of fertilizers is not alone to feed plants directly, but they exert a beneficial chemical effect upon the soil. Thus, salt, gypsum, and other saline matters may convert insoluble potash and magnesia into soluble forms, and thus adapt them to a imilation. By constant addition of the best suited fertilizers, the same crop might indefinitely be taken from a chosen piece of land; but it is found much more economical to have a judicious rotation of crops, since each finds elements in the soil not needed by others, and after a few years the soil regains the conditions nece ary to the profitable cultivation of some former crops. By letting fields lie fallow, or unworked, for a number of years, as in the old system of agriculture, the same result is produced. The study of this subject has been actively prosecuted for many years back, and though much remains to be learned, many important results in agricultural economy have been attained. Of useful books on A. C. , those of Liebig and Bou ingault stand first, though the subject has been much advanced in the hands of more recent writers. See AGRICULTURE, NITRIFICATION. Agricultural Colleges. Institutions of learning whose purpose is to teach and promote knowledge in the various arts and sciences that relate in any way to agriculture. Colleges of this character are recent in institution. Agricultural schools were established in Europe early in the nineteenth century, but it was not until Liebig published his celebrated work on agricultural chemistry, in 1840, that any active impulse was given to them. They are now numerous and important. Pru ia has four A. C. of the highest grade, with about forty le er schools, all with model farms; and similar encouraging progre has been made though out Germany, in France, and in some other countries. The benefit derived from these schools is best shown in the steady increase of crops per acre of soil where scientific agriculture is most fully taught and practiced. In England the first school of this character was the Royal Agricultural College, founded near Cirencester in 1845. It is now known as the Royal Agricultural College of England. Later examples are the Aspatria Agricultural College, near Car lisle, and the Minto House, at Edinburgh. The first A. C. in this country were established before 1850, but they received their first useful impetus from the pa age by Congre of the Land Grant Act of 1862. By this act Congre granted for school purposes to every State and territory land scrip representing 30,000 acres for each senator and representative. This was for the purpose of providing schools which, while not including general scientific and cla ical studies, should be particularly devoted to such branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts. The total area of land thus granted amounted to 9,597,840 acres, the sale of which produced an endowment fund of $15,866,371. In 1890 Congre pa ed a supplementary act, giving to each State, for the endowment of the colleges established, a sum of $15,000 for the first year, and increas ing by $1,000 annually until $25,000 was reached, which sum should afterwards be the annual appropriation. In 1892 there were 48 such colleges in existence, of which 32 reported in the census year had an income of $1,407,242. The instruction given in these institu.. tions is both theoretical and practical, general studies being introduced, but particular attention being given to those branches which relate to the interests of the farming community. The colleges are all connected with experimental farms, on which the students may study the results of rotation of crops, the effects of different fertilizers, the breeding and care of domestic animals, the dairy proce es, and, in short, everything bearing upon the succe ful pursuit of agriculture. The outcome of these studies cannot but prove of great eventual advantage to the farming interests of this country. Agricultural Experiment Station. An establishment devoted to the purpose of acquiring information that will be of advantage to the farming interests. -Scientific experiment in agriculture began at Rothamsted, England, in 1843, at the experiment station of Mr. John Lawes, and was carried on with very important results. To the influence of this station and its fruitful experiments is believed to be due the fact that, while the average yield of wheat in England in 1840 was about 13 bushels per acre, in 1885 it had increased to more than 31 bushels per acre. The growth of hay has doubled in quantity. Agricultural experiment has been still more fully carried on in Germany, and Europe now has more that 100 such stations. The first station in the U. S. was established in 1875, at Middle town, Conn. In 1880 there were four in operation. At present every State has at least one station, and some have more than one. Experiments of a practical character are steadily prosecuted at these stations, and results of great economical value have been produced, while still greater ones may confidently be looked for. Agricultural Machinery. Nothing in inventive genius has yielded more practical and important results than the progre that has been made in machine tools for use on the farm within the nineteenth century, by the aid of which the drudgery of farm life has been greatly reduced and the productivene of the ground much increased, while great progre has been made in the saving of labor. It is estimated that the mowing and reaping machines alone, which are now in use, annually save the labor of 2,000,000 men in the harvest season. These tools are indispensable on the great farms of the West, which are often of many sq. miles in area, while human labor is so scarce that their cultivation by the old method would be impo ible. Hence the old plows have been replaced by steam and sulky plows; the seed, formerly sown by hand, is now planted by horse-drawn machines; while mowers and reapers are similarly worked by steam or horse power. The service of the modern plow is far in advance of that of the old, the new harrows are far more efficient in turning and pulverizing the earth, and the use of grain planting machines is attended with great advantages. Instead of the irregular broadcast sowing of old times, these place the seed more evenly and at more uniform depths, a smaller quantity of seed is required, and the speed of planting is greatly increased. For sowing in drills and rows the saving in labor is great, the old laborious hand dropping and covering with the hoe being avoided, while the speed is vastly greater. Many such grain drills are now in use, whose performance is almost magically perfect. The regularity with which the seed is placed in the ground also permits the use of horse-drawn cultivators, where formerly the hoe had to be laboriously used. In cutting gra and grain equal progre has been made. The old methods with the scythe and sickle entailed the severest labor, which is now avoided by the use of mowing and reaping machines, which are among the most efficient of laborsaving implements. In the invention of these machines the United States stands at the head of the world, and has produced reaping machines whose performance is almost incredibly complete. The most recent of these machines not only cuts the standing grain, but by a raking attachment gathers it into bundles, and by a binding device ties these bundles neatly with twine and casts them off complete and of uniform size. A single man driving the horses can do all this work, and can at will regulate the size of the bundles and the tightne with which they are bound. When we consider that more than 100,000 of these machines are made and sold annually, and that they consume over 30,000 tons of twine in binding a single year's crop, we may estimate the saving, which is equal to from 6 to 10 per cent. in the cost of the wheat. As regards the gra harvest, the hay tedder to es up the hay so that it may be quickly and evenly dried, and the hay carrier greatly expedites the unloading and stacking. By its aid a man, and a boy to drive the horse, can unload a ton of hay in five minutes. The thrashing machine is another of the important labor-saving devices, while the horse powers and steam motors, now so widely in use on farms, still further expedite and make easy the work of the farmer. This description of A. M. is nece arily brief and incomplete, and yields but a glimpse of the marvels that have been accomplished in that field of enterprise. Agriculture, Department of. A newly organized department of the U. S. Government, which had its origin in an agricultural commi ion established at Washington in 1862, and which was changed by Congre to a Government department in 1889, its head, or Secretary, becoming a member of the President's cabinet. This department has under its care all subjects relating to the wide-spread agricultural intereste See AIR-BLADDER. Air-blast, n. ( Phys .) A current of air forced upon a fire to stimulate combustion, or on a dynamo-commutator to prevent sparking. IMG:content-0451.jpg:[graphic] a. of the country, and by the aid of monthly and annual probably correct explanation of the origin of this organ. reports di eminates information of great value to those interests. It buys seeds and plants, experiments with them in propagating, gardens and distributes them to the farming community of the country, one of its purposes being the introduction of new and useful plants in the U. S. Its building stands west of the grounds of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, embracing two bureaus, one of Animal Industry and one of the Weather, and po e ing an office of experiment stations, a her- barium, museum, library, chemical laboratory, and propagating gardens. The monthly reports of this de- part ment on the condition and prospects of the staple crops of the country and the different States are especi- ally valuable, alike to the commercial and the agricul- tural population. Air-bound, normally by the presence of air, as occasionally occurs in the use of suction pipes, etc. (Mech.) Prevented from acting Agur ( ah - good ), a town of Hindostan, 41 m. N. E. of Kota; pop . (1895) 30,000. Ahlquist, AUGUST ENGELBERT, a philologist, born at Knopis, Finland, Aug. 7, 1826. He became ardent in the study and advancement of the Finnish language, travelling under great difficulties in northern Ru ia and Siberia to study the speech of the Ural-Altaic tribes, and seeking to create a national Finnish literature. In 1862 he was made profe or of Finnish language and literature in the University of Helsingfors, in which city he died Nov. 20, 1889. He published a number of phi logical works and wrote many poems in the Finnish language. Ahl wardt, THEODORE WILHELM, a German Arabic scholar, born at Greifswald, July 4, 1828, and becoming profe or of Oriental languages in his native town in 1861. He has written several works on the ancient poetry of the Arabians, and is the most eminent living authority on this subject. Aide-de-Camp, ( ād ' - de -cawng.) n. [Fr.] ( Milit . ) A confidential officer selected by a general to a ist him in his duties. Each general officer has a number of these aides, the group being called his staff. They are attached to his person, receive his orders, and convey them, when nece ary, in writing or verbally, to different parts of the army in times of battle or manœuver. In the U. S. service an aide-de-camp ranks as a istant adjutant-general. There are allowed 6 (colonels) to a general; 2 and a military secretary (lieutenant-colonels) to a lieutenant general; 3 (captains or lieutenants) to a major-general; and 2 (lieutenants) to a brigadier-general.