646 Transactions of the American Institute. 



them in the pit, and pour over them diluted sulphuric acid. Cover 

 tlieni in with dry muck or garden loam. They will soon dissolve. 

 If the weather is warm they will dissolve faster. Crushed bones in 

 hogsheads with strong wood ashes, kept warm and moistened with 

 soap-suds, will soften into mass like jelly, that is soluble in water. 



Dr. D. D. Parmalee. — The addition of sulphuric acid by the 

 farmer without reference to proper proportions would be likely to 

 change bones into sulphate of lime, and become a very expensive 

 fertilizer. It would be better to finely pulverize the bones where 

 power is cheap, and let the earth dissolve them, or, to sell the bones 

 outriglit for thirty to forty dollars a ton, and use the money to buy 

 guano. 



Mr. James A. Whitney. — If chemistry has done anything for the 

 farmer, it is in treating bones. The addition of sulphuric acid does 

 not turn bones into plaster, but into superphosphate of lime ; thus 

 two great points are gained, the phosphorus is increased, and the 

 w^ioIg is converted from a slow, torpid, insoluble mass into a lively, 

 soluble, prompt manure. 



Cotton Seed as a Fertilizer. 



Mr. I, E. Tate, Osyka, Miss. — The agricultural club of Washing- 

 ton Parish, La., at its last monthly meeting had the following ques- 

 tions under del)ate, which they desired me, as their corresponding 

 secretary, to transmit to you for decision, or rather for your opinion 

 thereon . 



Question 1. When cotton seed is applied as a fertilizer, and it 

 germinates, springing up, is its manurial virtue impaired ? And if 

 yea, how much ? Please answer in tenths, the latter. 



Question 2. Upon an acre of laud that will produce (without man- 

 ure) twenty busliels of corn, what number of bushels may be expected 

 when 300 pounds of good superphosphate of lime is applied ? 



Permit me to say that our two " ends of the Union " having no 

 longer any sectional cause for disturbance, may ever remain fast 

 friends, indissolubly bound by our connnon love of country, one com- 

 mon constitution, and one common banner. 



Mr. J. B. Lyman. — The American Institute Club reciprocates the 

 expressions of friendship from the distant gulf shore, and is rejoiced 

 to see that the minds of our southern Ijrethern are so much engrossed 

 with the all important question of fertilizei's. To the first we 

 answer : The young plant at first grows exclusively at the expense of 



