ASI 



ASP 



Alumina, insoluble io acids 

 Alumina, soluble . 



Lime 



Magnesia 



Oxide of Manganese 

 Oxide and Sulpliurei of Iron 



percent. 



62 

 5 

 6 

 8 

 3 



16 



100 

 Such a mixture as this would no 

 doubt benefit many soils by the alu- 

 mina, as well as by ihe lime and mag- 

 nesia it contains ; but in coal ashes 

 a small quantity of alkaline matter, 

 chiefly soda, is generally present. 

 The constitution of the ash of our 

 best coals, therefore, may be con- 

 sidered as very nearly resembling 

 tliat of peat ash, and as susceptible 

 of similar applications. When well 

 burned, it can, in many cases, be ap- 

 plied with good effects as a top-dress- 

 ing to grass lands which are over- 

 grown with moss, while the admix- 

 ture of cinders in the ash of the less 

 perfectly burned coal produces a fa- 

 vourable physical change upon strong 

 clay soils. 



Cane Ashes. — I may allude here to 

 the advantage which in sugar-grow- 

 ing countries may be obtained from 

 the restoration of the cane ash to 

 the fields in which the canes have 

 grown. After the canes have been 

 crushed in the mill, they are usually 

 employed as fuel in boiling down tlie 

 sirup, and the ash, which is not un- 

 frequently more or less melted, is, I 

 believe, almost uniformly neglected ; 

 at all events, is seldom applied again 

 to the land. According to the prin- 

 ciples I have so often illustrated in 

 the present lectures, such procedure 

 must sooner or later e.xhaust the soil 

 of those saline substances which are 

 most essential to the growth of the 

 cane plant. If the ash were applied as 

 a top-dressing to the young canes, or 

 put into the cane holes near the roots 

 — having been previously mixed with 

 a quantity of wood ash, and crushed if 

 it happen to have been melted — this 

 exhaustion would necessarily take 

 place much more slowly. — (Johnson.) 

 ASILUS. A Linnaean genus of 

 dipterous insects, in which the mouth 

 is furnished with a horny, projecting, 

 iC 



straight, two-valved sucker, and gib- 

 bous at tiie base : antennae filiform, 

 approximate, of two articulations ; 

 body oblong and conical in shape. 

 The insects of this genus prey on 

 other insects, especially those of the 

 dipterous and lopidopterous orders. 



ASPAR.AGIN. The white crys- 

 talline principle found in the juice of 

 the asparagus, supposed to be a di- 

 uretic. It is resolved, by boiling in 

 water with magnesia, into ammonia 

 and aspartic and. 



ASPARAGUS. Asparagus officina- 

 lis. A perennial plant growing on 

 sandy meadows near the sea. The 

 young shoots (torus) form an esteem- 

 ed vegetable, and are susceptible of 

 high cultivation. They may be raised 

 from roots or seed. The seed is sown 

 in April, in rich soil an inch deep, in 

 rows eighteen inches apart, and the 

 ground kept clean. In two or three 

 seasons the roots will be large enough 

 to transplant to permanent beds. The 

 new plantation is made in March or 

 April ; the ground must be light, deep, 

 and rich, and well dug. The beds are 

 made six feet wide, with alleys of two 

 feet between them ; three rows of 

 root-stools are placed in each bed, at 

 the depth of six inches and distance 

 of a foot. Every spring the bed is 

 forked or loosened, and a dressing 

 of well-rotted stable manure mixed 

 with the upper soil. The roots send 

 up abundant shoots wlien kept moist 

 with water during the season, if suf- 

 ficient rain does not fall. A sprink- 

 ling of salt with the manure is a very 

 great improvement. Indeed, in Spain, 

 I asparagus is cultivated in beds sub- 

 ject to inundations of the sea. All 

 animal manures increase the growth. 

 To enlarge the size of the shoot, they 

 place, in Germany, small flower pots 

 or other tubular vessels over the earth 

 as soon as the shoot appears ; it grows 

 into these, and, being deprived of light, 

 remains white and tender, attaining 

 the size of the vessel in some cases. 

 Sixteen rods of bed will yield 200 to 

 300 heads a day during the season. 

 The beds last, with management, a 

 long term of years ; indeed, some are 

 known forty years old. 



