Id 



all their crops. If an acre of ground yield 25 bushels of wheat, the crop 

 will remove, in the straw and grain, 21 pounds of potash; or if the crop 

 be corn, at 50 bushels per acre, each acre will be taxed to furnish about 

 75 pounds of potash. It is true that a large amount of this is returned 

 to the soil, if the straw and stalks be not wasted ; yet there is a large 

 <3xpenditure in the grain which is put into the market, and which is an 

 <?ntire loss to the soil. A few years ago nearly all the potash of com- 

 merce was obtained from wood-ashes by the process of leaching. The 

 large demand for the article in various manufactures, and the failing 

 snpply of wood-ashes, induced various efforts to manufacture potash 

 salts from feldspar and from sea-water. These efforts would probably 

 have been successful but for the discovery of immense deposits of chlo- 

 ride of potassium associated with the mines of rock-salt at Stassfurt, in 

 Prussia. The saline deposit is nearly 700 feet thick, (200 meters ;) 500 

 feet of the lower portion of which being nearly j^ure rock-salt, (chloride 

 of sodium,) while the upper member consists of a mixture of the sul- 

 I)hate of magnesia, chloride of sodium, and the double chloride of mag- 

 nesium and potassium, the last-named salt forming 55 per cent, of the 

 compound. This upper, or potash member of the mine, is about 90 feet 

 thick, and sufQcient explorations have been made to warrant the conclu- 

 sion that at least six millions of tons of chloride of potassium may be 

 taken from it. 



The potash is separated from the other salts at the mine, and is 

 chiefly sold as " muriate of potash," which is nearly a j)ure potassic chlo- 

 ride. A considerable portion of it, however, is now converted into car- 

 bonate of potassa, by a process similar to that by which soda is produced 

 from common s^lt, and the manufacture of caustic potash is also carried 

 on at this place to a considerable extent. The amount of potash annu- 

 ally produced from the mines of Stassfurt is stated at about 30,000 tons, 

 ■chiefly in the form of the " muriate," which is fast becoming a current 

 article of commerce in all the market centers of Euroi^e and America. 

 The price at the mines is reported to range from $30 to $40 per ton, ac- 

 cording to the degree of purity. At this i^rice, allowing a fair margin 

 for transportation and profit, Prussian potash can be advantageously 

 used as a fertilizer iu this country. But it certainly would not be ad- 

 visable for an American farmer to look to Germany for potash to sui)ply 

 his crops, while he suffers ashes to go to waste on his farm, or in his 

 neighborhood. The discovery of mineral potash at Stassfurt warrants 

 the hope that the great alkaline plains, which form so large a jtart of 

 the central plateau of this continent, will, at no distant day, furnish a 

 .similar supply. 



SCIENTIFIC NOTES. 



FOKEIGN COMMENDATION OF THE REPORT OF THE AGRICULTURAL 



Department. — We find in " Nature " an appreciative notice of the an- 

 nual and monthly reports of the United States Department of Agricul- 

 t;ire. Much astoDishment is expressed iu the article at the unexampled 

 magnitude of the editions of these works published ; and inquiry is made 

 as to why similar enterprises are not conducted by the government iu 

 Great Britain. Noticing, particularly, the l^ct that our Department of 

 Agriculture has charge of everything connected in any way with the in- 

 terest in question, and that it not only prosecutes inquiries, but publishes 

 valuable and thoroughly digested reports on the different subjects, it calls 



