166 TRANSACTIONS OF THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE. 



biid been cut green, but will not yield so much nourishment. 

 Those persons Avbo want fat animals should cut their grass early; 

 and if they prefer to have their stock poor, let them cut it late. 

 Adjourned. 



June 26, 1866. 

 Mr. Nathan C. Ely in the chair; Mr. J. W. Chambers, Secretar3^ 



City Garbage as a Fertilizer. 



Dr. Thompson, Auburn, N. Y., addressed the club at some 

 length upon the subject of using city garbage as the base of a 

 most valuable fertilizer. In a sanitary point of view, he showed 

 that such use of garbage would be of the greatest advantage to 

 the city. He would have air-tight boxes set out upon the pave- 

 ment in front of tenant houses, or where there is a large accumula- 

 tion of garbage, with strict requirements to have every decay- 

 ing substance phiced therein, which could be perfectly deodorized 

 and disinfected by a compound which is as follows : No. 1, as per 

 "specification" contains by measure six parts gypsum, finely 

 ground ; two parts charcoal, prepared, coarsely granulated ; two 

 parts pure lime, fresh burned, finely ground ; one part hard wood 

 ashes ; one part common salt. No. 2 will contain four parts 

 gypsum ; four parts charcoal ; four parts lime. No. 3 will contain 

 four parts charcoal ; four parts lime. 



The gypsum which the doctor has used in the preparation of 

 this compound comes from the Cayuga beds, which contain a large 

 proportion of native sulphur mingled with the rock in its forma- 

 tion, which increases its power as an oxydizing agent. The plaster 

 is dried and finely ground in connection v>uth the lime, which for 

 this purpose should be burned and drawn hot from the kiln with the 

 least possible exposure to the air during the process of grind- 

 ing. 



The charcoal should be prepared from the body-wood of the 

 sugar maple, and burned in the earth-pit, by what is known as the 

 " slow process," which chars the wood most perfectly, and at the 

 same time preserves its porus structure. This charcoal is again 

 recharred to drive off all gases; this is effected in cylinders in 

 which the air may be admitted or excluded at pleasure, thus pro- 

 ducing a purer and more eflScicnt sanitary charcoal than by any 

 other known apparatus. The charcoal thus prepared, is passed 



