USE AS A FERTILIZER. 65 



superphosphate was made something after this maimer : There 

 were four hundred pounds of dried meats, which were pro- 

 cured from Chicago for nitrogenous purposes, two hundred 

 pounds of guano, some potash, and the balance consisted of 

 these phosphates, which had been rendered serviceable by the 

 use of sulphuric acid. That superphosphate was sold at forty- 

 five dollars per ton. All who have used this fertilizer attest 

 its wonderful effect, and especially upon the cotton crop of 

 the South, which you all know has increased very much 

 within the last few years. Without this fertilizer those lands 

 would have become, most of them, almost absolutely sterile. 

 This article is used more largely at the South, where they 

 know more about it by every-day trial, than anywhere else, 

 and I think that is sufficient proof of the richness of this 

 material ; but whether we have arrived at its best fruits or 

 not, I am unable to say. 



Pardon me one word in regard to the wonderful care of 

 Providence, which provides for us in all those extremities to 

 which the human race is subject. Take, for instance, the 

 fact that when our country had become almost denuded of its 

 forests, He unbosomed the mountains and furnished us with 

 coal to make us comfortable. Take, for instance, the fact, 

 that when the whale had become almost extinct, He opened 

 the bowels of the earth, as it were, and revealed oil enough, 

 to all present appearances, to last while the world shall stand. 

 So in relation to this very fertilizing material : when our lands 

 had become almost exhausted in consequence of removing so 

 many successive crops, and the lack of fertilizing material, 

 He gave us the islands of guano ; and when those were 

 stripped of this substance, then He unbosomed these immense 

 tracts in the South, which are almost inexhaustible. Gentle- 

 men, I have got off the track a little ; but I cannot help utter- 

 ing this thought in connection with the point to which I have 

 just referred. I am a merchant as well as a farmer, although 

 I claim to be a farmer first, because that is my favorite occu- 

 pation. In times past, we have had, every few years, a finan- 

 cial crisis, arising from the fact of our being in debt to foreign 

 nations for the importations of goods. But God has opened 

 the bowels of our mountains at the West and given us gold, 

 and spread out for us fertile fields, whereby we are able at all 

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