84 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



bag came to Amherst marked in a certain way. Dr. Goess- 

 mann was waiting for it, and he took a sample and went to 

 the laboratory, and had an analysis made of it. I had 

 received the analysis of the man in Boston, and he said that 

 it contained forty-eight per cent, of actual potash. The next 

 day, Dr. Goessmanu came to me and said that he had analyzed 

 a sample from the same bag, and that it contained eight and 

 a quarter per cent. Now, there was never found in this 

 country any of this material that contained forty-eight per 

 cent. If he had taken all the materials in it, — potash, soda, 

 magnesia, and all, — it would not have made forty-eight per 

 cent. ; and yet the Boston chemist certified, over his own 

 signature, that he had analyzed it, and that it did contain 

 forty-eight per cent. All I have to say about it further is, 

 that Dr. Goessmann went to Boston the next day on the 

 train, and Mr. So-and-So was very polite, and has been ever 

 since. 



I have wandered from my subject, but I could not help 

 spitting this out. On the 20th day of July, we weighed out 

 the necessary amount of potash to make up the deficiency, 

 and put it on the land, hoed it into the corn and potatoes, so 

 as to make our experiment a success, if possible. The result 

 on the corn was what I have told you. I lacked a little less 

 than three-quarters of a bushel of getting my fifty bushels. 

 The potatoes lacked only nine bushels on a hundred of what 

 I said I should get ; but we could not get the potash to the 

 various places over the country to which we had sent the 

 materials to supply the requisite quantity, and the consequence 

 was, that the experiment was in every instance a failure. 

 There was no success anywhere, except where we put the 

 potash in on the College farm. The farmers have recorded 

 them as failures, but said at the same time, they never raised 

 such corn with any fertilizer that they had ever bought as 

 they raised with that stuff; but they did not get what I asked 

 for. I speak of those experiment as failures, but they have 

 taught me this, that my original proposition is perhaps true ; 

 that if I had mixed the potash in proper proportion, and sent 

 it over the country, every one of those experiments would 

 have been a success, just as the experiment on the College 

 farm was a success, where the potash was put in. 



