112 LETTER-FILES OF S. W. JOHNSON 



erate scientific convention than a mere business meeting of 

 the Society . . . — papers to be read, and such discussion 

 upon them and subjects they may suggest to be duly chroni- 

 cled and put in print as portions of the Society's Trans- 

 actions for the year. Will you come up and help us? You 

 Avill give me a paper this j^ear for the Transactions, and had 

 as well come up and read it. . . . 



On January 7, 1857, at the annual meeting of the 

 Connecticut State Agricultural Society, at Hartford, 

 Professor Johnson spoke, in part, as follows, his sub- 

 ject being ''Frauds in Commercial Manures." 



Almost within fifteen years, a new and extensive business 

 has sprung up in those countries whose industrial develop- 

 ment is most rapidly progressing; viz., the trade in concen- 

 trated and costly fertilizers. . . . Can we command the sup- 

 plies we need without fear of fraud ? In answer to this ques- 

 tion, I may reply: At present the farmer is entirely at the 

 mercy of the manufacturer or dealer. . . . But before going 

 further let us inquire : What is fraud ? We must, as farmers 

 and business men, answer this question with pure reference 

 to our own interests, without at all considering the motives 

 of those who defraud us. A fraud, then, is selling to the 

 farmer an adulterated or damaged fertilizer of established 

 name : or imposing upon him worthless or inferior fertilizers, 

 under names calculated to deceive and at exorbitant prices. 

 When, in short, the farmer does not get from the dealer the 

 value of his money, or the kind of materials he bargains for, 

 he is defrauded. The readers of the agricultural papers know 

 the history of the Chilian guano fraud, which Joseph Harris, 

 Esq., now editor of the Genesee Farmer, detected and traced 

 to its source Avith so much fearlessness and ability. The 

 results of my own numerous analyses of manures which have 

 been published in the Homestead, during 1856, show unde- 

 niably that there are yet among us those who think the farmer 



