PKOF. HOSFORD'S ADDRESS. 391 



As a fair discussion and true exposition of the merits of the 

 various articles used for fertilizing purposes, as far as their 

 chemical and mechanical condition affect their relative value, 

 has everywhere proved a most efficient means to correct mis- 

 conception regarding the requirements of a good fertilizer, 

 there is no reason why the same remedy, judiciously applied, 

 should not be successful with us. 



Before closing this report, I feel obliged to refer, in a 

 few words, to a late address "To Dealers in Fertilizers," 

 published in a Boston paper, by Prof. E. N. Hosford, in 

 which the writer, among other topics, questions the merits 

 of the usual mode of determining the value of fertilizers in 

 the laboratory of chemists by analysis, etc. ; first, because 

 chemists differ in their commercial valuation ; second, the 

 results obtained in the field experiments referred to in the 

 address do not confirm the comparative value assigned by 

 analysis to the two fertilizers on trial. In regard to the first 

 point, I concede that chemists differ somewhat regarding the 

 value they assign to some of the essential constituents of fer- 

 tilizers, yet it is also true that they differ, as a general rule, 

 wherever the identity of the article has been established, far less 

 than manufacturers and dealers. It can scarcely be other- 

 wise ; for the chemist does not propose to make the market 

 price of fertilizers ; he leaves that to competition, and strives 

 simply to record the latter correctly, according to his best 

 information, for a limited district, and with reference to the rel- 

 ative amount of essential ingredients which the various articles 

 for sale contain. The values adopted in my first report are based 

 on the retail price of " fine bone " at Boston, which is $50 per ton. 



Assuming the average composition of a fair article of that 

 kind — which experience fully indorses — to be from 22 to 24 

 per cent, of insoluble phosphoric acid, and from 3.5 to 4 per 

 cent, of nitrogen, I had to allow, for obvious reasons, 6 cents 

 per pound for phosphoric acid and 30 cents per pound for 

 nitrogen, to arrive at a valuation of $50 per ton, the amount 

 which it brings in the market. The same article, if sold in 

 larger quantities, costs but from $38 to $40 per ton, while it 

 sells in Chicago at $25 per ton. All I claimed in my first 

 report for my valuation was, that our manufacturers would be 

 obliged to consider it liberal ; feeling, at the same time, quite 



