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MONTHLY JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURE. 



ouply analVi^cd, without the fact hcing known to such Society, the answer would 

 be but a reference to the result of such analysis already made. 



Were it possible to give to the problem in this case, or any other agricultural 

 question, a warlike attraction, to connect it in any way with the shedding of 

 human blood and the shouts that follow as it flows ; could we, as in the case 

 of the " gun cotton,'''' raise the question whether corn cobs could not be rendered 

 as combustible and destructive as cold steel or gunpowder, tlien should we bring 

 it, forsooth, within the pale of the Constitution, and every head of every depart- 

 ment of the Government might easily be put in requisition, as in that case, with 

 the Chief Magistrate in front, to lend the sanction of his name and scholarship 

 to the results of analytical investigation in every form that the science of the 

 military schools could suggest. In sober earnestness, and for the benefit of Agri- 

 culture, we really wish that some speculative genius would get out a patent for 

 turning corn cobs and corn shucks into munitions of war ; for then before the 4th 

 of July we should learn more of their real substance and proportions than for the 

 vulgar uses of Agriculture will be found out in the next forty years. 



In the mean time we must endeavor to hold up some of the lights which have 

 already been elicited by scientific and public spirited individuals at home and 

 abroad. Exactly twenty-eight years ago we published the very interesting paper 

 which follows, on the distillation of the meal of Indian corn and cob, as com- 

 pared with that of the grain alone, and on the advantages of grinding both to- 

 gether as food for horses. It was from the pen of Peter Minor, of Albemarle, 

 Virginia, a man of rare acquirements and usefulness, whose modesty was equaled 

 only by his merit, and was addressed to that eminent agriculturist and philan- 

 thropic citizen, General John H. Cocke, Vice President of the Society. 



made in the month of March.) The distiller 

 mentioned an important fact that occurred 

 ill the process. He found tliat the fennenta- 



Ten bushels of the com and cob ground to- 

 gether were taken, wliich weighed 367 lbs., 

 and ten bushels of pure com meal were taken, 

 which weighed 400 lbs. They were both 

 brewed or mashed on the same day, and dis- 

 tilled separately, with gi-eat care and accu- 

 racy. The product of the pure com was 18 

 gallons, and the product of the mixture, or 

 corn and cobs, was 13 gallons of spirit, each 

 of the same degi-ee of proof Now, it is gen- 

 erally agreed that the cob constitutes about 

 one-half of the bulk of com ; in other words, 

 ■we give two measures in the ears for one 

 shelled, and the cobs are either used as fuel 

 or thrf>wn away as of no value. If this were 

 tnie, the product of the mixture then should 

 have been only 9 gallons, which is the lialf 

 of what the pm-e com produced. But 13 

 were obtained, 4 of which must have been, 

 of course, extracted from the cobs ; or if wo 

 estimate its nutiitive power by the quantity 

 of spirit, it is clear tliat wlicnever we shell 

 ten bushels of com, and thi-ow away the cobs, 

 ■we throw away a portion of food equal to the 

 difference between!) and 13, or neailyone-lialf 



As it relates to the respective weight of 

 each, the difference in favor of the mixture is 

 Btill greater, the pure meal l)eiiig more than 

 three pounds lieavier in the bushel, and I am 

 inclijied to tliink that llic product of the mix- 

 ture would have been gi'oater if th(! experi- 

 ment had been made earlier in the year, be- 

 fore the cobs had lost nnich of their sub- 

 Btance by evaporation, (my experunent was 

 (1114) 



tion of tlie mixture took place much sooner 

 and was perfected a day or two earlier than 

 the other. His exjiression was that it maslied 

 much easier aud better than anything he had 

 tried before, and which he accounted for by 

 supposing that the particles of the cob being 

 lighter aud coarser than those of the grain, 

 but mixed together, prevented too close and 

 heavy a deposition of the mass at the bottom 

 of his bre^wing-tub. 



These facts are particularly worthy tlie at- 

 tention of dif.tillers, and 1 think ai-e perfectly 

 satisfactory as to the v;Jue of com cobs in 

 the pniduction of spirits. Whether tliey aj-e 

 equally so m relation to their value, as a food. 

 Is left to the chemists to detennine. We -axe 

 aware that the siicchariue particles, or those 

 yielding spirits, are not tlie only constituents 

 of nounslnnent. We know that oily and mu- 

 cilaginous particles are the conijunient and 

 necessary pai'ts of food, liut wliich prepon- 

 derates, or in \\\\:\\ propoi-rion to each otlier 

 they are requii'ed to exist, in order to consti- 

 tute a healtliy food, I do not pretend to 

 know. It is cert;un, liowever, tliat the lat- 

 ter two do exist, in some degi'oe, in the cobs 

 of com ; and since tlie expcn 'iice of all who 

 liave tried it, coiK-iu' in reporting it to be the 

 most healthy mode of feeding corn, perhaps 

 it will not be unfair to infer that they main- 

 tain a due aud proper propoilion to tho 



