STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY 109 



The rather remarkable fact is to be recorded in this 

 connection, that, although private interests were thus 

 attacked, the sincerity of his motives and the accuracy 

 and honesty of his work were never seriously ques- 

 tioned. This series of articles in the Homestead 

 attracted much attention; the "shomng up" of the 

 fertilizers considered caused his analyses to be widely 

 copied and commented on, and gave rise to correspond- 

 ence on the subject. Mr. Johnson kept a copy of a 

 letter in which he defined his position in the matter — 

 this letter was written in answer to a vigorous remon- 

 strance and appeal from his results, addressed to him 

 by the agents for one of the brands of fertilizers 

 which he had analyzed and described in the Home- 

 stead: 



New Haven, Ct., June 13, 1856. 



Gentlemen, — I received today your letter and sending of 

 Guano. All the analyses I had intended to make are 



already in progress. I cannot therefore examine the speci- 

 mens you have forwarded, especially as they are so similar 

 in appearance to those being examined and as it is not claimed 

 by the Company that they have more than one kind of Guano. 

 I would readily extend the number of analyses were it neces- 

 sary in order to promote the end I have in view. The con- 

 current testimony of my own results (not yet quite complete), 

 and those obtained by no less distinguished a chemist than 

 Dr. Anderson, chemist to the Highland and Ag. Soc. of Scot- 

 land, and by Prof. Campbell Morfit of Baltimore, is that the 

 analyses you pubhsh in your circular were either made on 

 different specimens from the authentic ones I have been 

 examining, or that the analyses have been stated in an in- 

 accurate manner, or at least in a way calculated to deceive 

 persons not familiar with chemistry. You will perceive this 

 involves a mistake, some will think a fraud, either in the 



