172 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



I 



At the risk of infringing on the prerogative of another honorable 

 committee, we quote from the same for authority, on a matter so 

 intimately connected with our subject, and of such vital moment, 

 that it will bear repetition even in a book. 



Having provided our reservoir for liquid cxcremcHt, we will point 

 to the best and most generally diffused absorbent for filling it — muck 

 — by introducing 



The ''Salt and Lime Mixtiire.^^ 

 [See "Working Farmer," Vol. 3, page 280.] 



" To three bushels of caustic lime, add one bushel of salt 

 dissolved in water. 



The salt water will slake the lime, and a chemical change will 

 take place. Salt is composed of chlorine and soda^ both of which 

 are valuable as manures. The lime will combine with the chlorine, 

 forming chloride of lime, while the soda, being set free from tho 

 chlorine, will take carbonic acid from the atmosphere, and become 

 carbonate of soda. Having commenced with salt and lime, we now 

 have in its stead, chloride of lime and carbonate of soda, four 

 bushels of which added to a cord of muck, peat, swamp-mud, woods- 

 earth, or other organic matter, will decompose in a short time, and 

 render it suitable for being composted with stable and other manures.* 



In making the salt and lime mixture, if the lime is not fresh 

 from the kiln, it will not receive all the dissolved salt the first day. 

 When this is the fact, turn over the pile the following day and add 



* [The method of preparing muck for use by means of salt and lime, introduced 

 by Dr. Dana, is a very valuable one, and worthy of extensive use. It is best done 

 by placing the liNie upon the muck, slaking it with a saiuraled solution of salt, and 

 then mixing the whole mass immediately and as thoroughly as possible, turning the 

 ■whole several times subsequently. 



But the extract from the " Working Farmer," as above given, makes erroneous 

 statements of the chemical changes which take place. " Common salt consists of 

 chlorine and sodium (not of chlorine and soda.) If water is added to it, the chlo- 

 rine will abstract from it hydrogen, and the sodium oxygen, and muriate of soda is 

 formed." This mu.-iate of soda is decomposed by caustic lime, which has a stronger 

 affinity for the muriatic acid than the soda has, and so muriate of lime is formed, 

 (not chloride of lime) and the soda set free, at first in a caustic state, which cnaldes 

 it to act more eflTuienlly upon the muck. It however gradually attracts carbonia 

 acid, and changes to carbonate of soda ; other, and more complicated combinations 

 and changes also take place, which it is not necessary here to enlarge upon. The 

 errors of statement thus referred to, do not affect the results of mixing salt and 

 lime in the least, but it is always better to use correct terms; and if the above 

 should lead any to think he could thus make rhlorlde of lime, he would find, 

 himself egregiously mistaken; for scarcely any two salts in common use are more 

 widely unlike in their uses, aud effects when used, than muriate of lime and chloride 

 of lime. — Ed.] 



