244 



Lime a Septic. — Prevention of the Dry-Rot. 



Vol. V. 



For Ihf Farmers' Cabinet. 

 liime, a Septic. 



Mr. Editor, — In the communication of 

 your intelligent correspondent " Agricola," 

 there is one proposition on a point of some 

 practical importance, to which I cannot yield 

 an unqualified assent. It is this, "That 

 lime, and all the alkaline earths and alkalies, 

 are antiseptics, and tend to diminish or im- 

 pede the tendency to putrefaction, may be 

 easily tested by any person disposed to make 

 the experiment;" and that the attempts 

 heretofore made to explain its beneficial ac- 

 tion, on the gratuitous assumption of its has- 

 tening the putrefaction of vegetable and ani- 

 mal matter, have failed, not being founded 

 on fact. 



Softly, Agricola — not so fast — the experi- 

 ment has been fairly made, and it has led to 

 results directly the reverse of such a conclu- 

 sion ; showing, that instead of retarding de- 

 composition or putrefaction (which in chem- 

 ical language are synonymous terms), the ad- 

 dition of lime, under certain circumstances, 

 promotes and hastens this operation in a very 

 extraordinary manner. 



What Agricola means by destructive de- 

 composition, as applied to the present case, 1 

 do not perceive: we are taught to believe 

 that in all kinds of chemical decomposition 

 the elements which are disengaged enter into 

 new combinations; forming new compounds, 

 but nothing is ever lost — not one atom. In 

 the chemical changes which take place in 

 the compound, lime must play a conspicuous 

 part, but cannot destroy that which is inde- 

 structible. To the phenomena of combustion, 

 to which he compares it, there can be little 

 analogy in its operation upon a mass nearly 

 saturated with water. The error into which 

 I believe Agricola has fallen, arises in this 

 case, as in most others, from a partial and im- 

 perfect view of the whole subject, as the se- 

 quel will clearly show that the action of lime, 

 under different circumstances, will be attend- 

 ed with opposite results; and this twofold 

 operation is distinctly pointed out, and, to my 

 mind, satisfactorily explained, by that great 

 chemist, to whom agricultural science is so 

 much indebted. Sir Humphry Davy. 



He says, that " in soft animal and vegeta- 

 ble substances, which are by nature soluble 

 in water, the mixture of lime forms new 

 compounds, which are insoluble," (of course 

 incapable of further chemical change), "and 

 in this way it greatly diminishes the pro- 

 perty of fermentation in the larger part of 

 them." 



On the other hand, he observes that " lime 

 renders soluble and suitable to the nourish- 

 ment of plants, some substances which, in 

 their natural state, do not possess this charac- 



teristic, and for this purpose the use of it 

 may be very advantageous. Thus, when it 

 is desirable to convert ligneous and Jibrous 

 plants into manure, it may be done by heat- 

 ing them with lime." It will therefore ap- 

 pear that the efficacy of lime in the last in- 

 stance, depends upon its great solvent pow- 

 ers, thereby reducing matter, otherwise inso- 

 luble, to that state which will bring it within 

 the range of chemical action, when fermenta- 

 tion at once commences, and is greatly ac- 

 celerated by the heat evolved during the pro- 

 cess. Some years ago, in pursuance of the 

 hint thrown out in the very passage here 

 quoted, I set to work to operate upon a pile 

 of chips at my door, which, in the course of 

 years, had accumulated to a very inconve- 

 nient bulk. These were thrown up in the 

 form of a stack, with an admixture of quick- 

 lime ; in the course of two weeks, a violent 

 fermentation had commenced throughout the 

 mass, by which it was reduced in six months 

 to less than one-third of its original dimen- 

 sions, having the appearance of fine vegeta- 

 ble mould, and proving a most efficacious 

 top-dressing to a piece of unproductive mea- 

 dow. 



Its agency in promoting the decomposition 

 of that mass of straw and stable-litter, with 

 which our barn-yards are encumbered in the 

 spring, is well known to our farmers, and is 

 often used for that purpose. The propriety 

 of the practice is another question — what I 

 contend for is this, that lime, applied in the 

 manner described, will reduce a mass of vege- 

 table matter in six months to the same state 

 precisely which it would require years to 

 arrive at by the ordinary course of decompo- 

 sition, and that it may be used for this pur- 

 pose in many cases, with much advantage. 



Aratob. 



Kishacoquillis Valley, Jan. 3, 1841. 



Prevention of the Dry-Rot. 



Sir W. Burnett's process for the pre- 

 vention of dry-rot, consists in applying a so- 

 lution of muriate of zinc to the cloth or other 

 substance to be preserved. It is very much 

 cheaper than where preparations of mercury 

 are used ; and to show how well it operated, 

 Dr. Reid exhibited two sets of specimens, in 

 every respect alike, of soldiers' cloth, sail- 

 cloth, ropes, &c., which were placed and 

 kept a year in one of the dampest cellars in 

 Somerset House ; the one set being in their 

 natural state, and the other impregnated 

 with the muriate of zinc ; and while the 

 former were quite rotten and had lost their 

 colour, and were easily torn to fragments, 

 the latter were as fresh in colour and as 

 strong in texture as when they were put 

 in. .- 



