SOILS FERTILIZERS. 13 



liifectiou with renewed force. There still remuins, for instance, the infection 

 due to handling and distribution ; to surface pollution due to the pernicious 

 practice of flooding ice to get a thicker crop ; to surface pollution due to rains 

 and melting snow washing pollution from side slopes on to ice that has already 

 formed ; and, finally, to the dangers of artificial ice when this has been manufac- 

 tured from contaminated water and delivered to consumers before the natural 

 processes of purification have had an opportunity to become active or effective." 



The prevention of stream pollution by strawboard waste, E. B. Phelps 

 (U. 8. Geol. Survey, Water-Supply and Irrig. Paper No. 189, pp. 29, pis. 2, figs. 

 2). — This bulletin describes briefly the manufacture of strawboard and the meth- 

 ods of disposal of the waste liquor from this manufacture, and reports laboratory 

 and field investigations in connection with a manufacturing plant at Urbana, 

 Ohio, on methods of treatment of the waste to prevent pollution of streams. 



The results of the experiments show that mechanical filtration through sand 

 without coagulation and a short period of sedimentation remove over 00 per 

 cent of suspended matter and yield an effluent which can be discharged into an 

 equal volume of reasonably pure water without creating a nuisance. 



" The sludge resulting from the sedimentation tanks, after pressing or spon- 

 taneous drying, is innocuous and makes good soil. It has some value as a fer- 

 tilizer and is particularly valuable to mix with the clay soils of the Middle 

 West to render them more porous." It is stated that the material contains a 

 considerable proportion of calcium carbonate and O.^-t per cent of available phos- 

 phoric acid. *' Other uses for this material are suggested, but they re(iuire 

 further study." 



Report of the commission on sewage irrigation of the city of Paris, 

 BouRNEViLLE ET AX. (AnH. Dir. Hydraul. et Ainelior. Agr., Mia. Agr. [France], 

 1906, No. 31, pp. 173-180).— The status in 1905 of the utilization of Paris sewage 

 in irrigation on farms near the city, especially at Gennevilliers, with reference 

 to pollution of the Seine, is briefly reported upon. It is made clear that the 

 constantly increasing volume of sewage can not be cared for by irrigation alone. 



Sewage and the bacterial purification of sewage, S. Rideal {London: The 

 Sanitary Pullishing Co., Ltd.; Ncto York: John Wiley <€ Sons, 1906, 3. ed., pp. 

 XII -{-355, figs. 58). — The revision of this third edition consists mainly in the 

 incorporation of recent progress in bacterial methods of sewage disposal and 

 the conclusions of the Royal Commission of Great Britain as far as they have 

 been published (E. S. R., 16, p. 1032). 



SOILS— FERTILIZERS. 



Further studies on the properties of unproductive soils, B. E. Livingston 

 ET AL. (r. (S*. Dcpt. Agr., Bur. Soils Bui. 36, pp. 77, pis. 7). — In continuation of 

 previous investigations (E. S. R., 17, p. 340), studies of the occurrence in unpro- 

 ductive soils of substances deleterious to plant growth have been extended to a 

 number of different soils, and observations have been made upon the effect of 

 organic fertilizers on the toxic properties of soils and on the toxicity of ordinary 

 distilled water. 



The soils investigated in addition to the Takoma lawn soil used in previous 

 experiments included a brownish yellow sandy loam subsoil from the Depart- 

 ment grounds, Miami silt loam from the Rhode Island Experiment Station farm, 

 and Volusia silt loam from the Ohio Station farm. The methods of investiga- 

 tion were substantially the same as those described in the previous bulletin. 

 The main conclusions drawn from the results of this investigation are sum- 

 marized as follows : " That toxic substances exist in these soils is apparent from 



