No. 6. DEPARTMENT OP AGRICULTURE. 453 



oxygen; 2.00 per cent, nitrogen; 11.00 per cent, ash constituent, with 

 a specific gravity of 1.05. Sulphur is almost never found. The ash 

 constituent will vary from a small fraction of one per cent, up to 15 

 per cent., the average of the peats of the United States being 3.07 

 per cent., while that of the German peats is 7.9 per cent. The poor- 

 est sample of peat which has been analyzed in my laboratory gave 

 the following constituents and percentages: Moisture, 10.64 per 

 cent.; nitrogen (2.03 per cent, ammonia), 2.16 per cent.; sulphur, 0.80 

 per cent.; volatile combustible matter, 40.00 per cent.; fixed carbon, 

 17.53 per cent.; ash, 27.58 per cent. Total, 100.00 per cent. It will 

 be observed that the ash yield was unusually high, but this was due 

 to the sample having been taken from a part of the peat bog where 

 the sand sediment from an emptying stream had settled. That same 

 bog, in other parts, ought to produce a peat with less than 3 per cent, 

 ash. 



Peat is known in general as the rich, dark brown mud found in 

 marsh and swamp lands. However, one should not forget that all 

 rich earth in which plant life grows readily is a form of peat, and 

 will be easily burned after carefully dried. 



In the old world peats are mostly composed of decayed mosses 

 and grasses. In this country we have several kinds of peat. The 

 main one, however, is like, the European peats, and is composed of 

 decayed sphagnaceae. On the Atlantic coast there is a variety of 

 so-called "salt march," which produces a peat which would not be of 

 any use for our purposes for fuel; but I have not found any salt 

 march peat in Pennsylvania. 



The peat mosses that make up our best Pennsylvania peat are 

 found almost entirely decayed, as a rule, though parts of the peat 

 deposits of Erie county seem to have remained, in some instances, 

 nearly as perfect as they would be expected to appear after one or 

 two years' cessation of growth. Before death occurs sphagnaceae 

 ma}' be seen growing in more or less compact tufts or patches on 

 the surface of some of our bogs, or floating in stagnant w r ater, and 

 some are on the borders of mountain rivulets. They are soft and 

 flaccid caulescent plants, generally of large size. They are whitish, 

 yellowish, or sometimes red or olive-colored, and are perennial. 

 The branches are generally spreading, in lateral fascicles of from 

 two to seven, rarely more, those at the summit of the stem capitate. 

 The leaves are nerveless, translucent, formed of a single layer of 

 two kinds of cells. In the Erie county peat bogs there has been so 

 little decay in some instances that the lateral fascicles are still on 

 the stems. There are about twenty-five North American species, 

 and many varieties or forms; but this general description will answer 

 for all practical purposes in our State, when any suspected peat bog 

 has been located. 



The Dismal Swamp of Virginia is one vast peat bog. We have not 

 a single deposit in Pennsylvania one-fourth its size, although in 

 Lawrence county there are many acres of land underlaid with good 

 peat. Almost all of New England is one mammoth peat bog, which 

 are coal measures in the primary process of formation. All coal has 

 been mud, and, hence, many kinds of mud can now be converted 

 into a substitute for coal. 



Peat is best adapted for fuel after the water has been pressed 

 out, and the material briquetted into proper sizes for use. In bri- 



