368 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Thirty-one establishments, supplied with excellent ma- 

 chinery, and situated along the railroad, served Until recently 

 for the manufacture of soda-nitre. Their manufacturino; 

 capacity amounted to 1,250 tons per day. There are now 

 some twenty more fictories in course of construction, calcu- 

 lated to raise the daily produce to 19,000 tons, or 5,750,000 

 tons per year. 



The Peruvian government has lately placed on it a tax of 

 25 cents per one hundred pounds, and also restricted the 

 manufacture to 4,500,000 tons per year. The standard strength 

 of the soda-nitre is set down at 95 per cent. ; yet this quality has 

 been of late but rarely noticed, on account of the unsettled 

 condition of the revenue laws in Peru. The article sold in our 

 markets has been more frequently found to contain from 91 to 

 92 per cent, of soda-nitre. As the bags in which it arrives 

 in our ports are frequently rotten, new bags being supplied, 

 one-eighth of one cent per pound is usually charged for re- 

 packing. The price during the month of July last was from 

 3^ to 3| cents gold per pound (including new bags) by the 

 ton. The strength of that article was 92 per cent, of nitrate 

 of soda, or 15.15 per cent, of nitrogen. One pound of 

 nitrogen in that quality of soda-saltpetre cost, therefore, 24.5 

 cents currency. 



A large proportion of the crude Chili saltpetre serves at 

 present for the manufacture of nitrate of potassa, commonly 

 called saltpetre, by means of the chloride of potassium of 

 Stassfurt, (jermany. Nitrate of soda and chloride of potas- 

 sium produce, by mutual exchange, chloride of sodium and 

 nitrate of potassa. The introduction of this process explains 

 the present lower price of common saltpetre as compared with 

 former years. Crude nitrate of potassa, containing from five to 

 ten per cent, of moisture and impurities, is oflered at Boston 

 at from eight to eight and one-fourth cents per pound by the ton. 

 A sample bought at that price contained 90.80 per cent, of nitrate 

 of potassa (equal to 42.44 per cent, of potassium oxide and 

 48.36 per cent, of nitric acid, or 12.44 per cent, of nitrogen, 

 representing a value of but $142,60 per ton) according to 

 the standard price previously adopted. Nitrate of potassa 

 proves thus to be a too expensive form of nitrogen and potas- 

 sium oxide for general fertilizing purposes. 



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