STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY 115 



use artificial or costly manures are always able to pay for an 

 analysis, but in this country a different procedure may be 

 advantageously followed; a procedure which, with far less 

 expenditure, will prove more efficacious. This plan is one 

 adapted to be carried into effect by your State Society, and is 

 as follows : Let a trustworthy chemist be employed to analyze 

 every year all the various manures that come into the Con- 

 necticut market. Let the analysis be made, not on samples 

 forwarded by the dealers, or manufactured for analysis, but 

 on sjjecimens procured by farmers themselves, such as shall 

 fairly represent the article that is spread upon the fields. 

 These samples should be procured from different places, and 

 the same manure should be repeatedly examined in order to 

 test the uniformity and reliability of its composition. The 

 analysis should be repeated every year, so that all improve- 

 ments or deteriorations in manufacture be kept pace with. 

 The results should be published in the organ of the Society, 

 so that all its members be informed what are good fertilizers, 

 and what are trash. With this system in skilful operation, 

 an honest dealer would sell his commodities nowhere more 

 gladly than in Connecticut, for he would be sure of finding 

 for them here a full and enlightened appreciation, while the 

 rogues would send their wares to some other market ; the risks 

 of detection would be too great for them to encounter. 



There remain a few points to be noticed. While the fanner 

 assumes an independent attitude toward the dealer, and shows 

 that he can defend himself from fraud and imposition, he 

 must not go too far and become arrogant or exacting. He 

 must accord to the manufacturer fair profits, and, living him- 

 self, let his neighbor live. Another point ; — a most careful 

 distinction must be drawn between the commercial and the 

 manurial value of a fertilizer. The former is told by chemical 

 analysis, the latter by trial on the field. When, therefore, 

 chemical analysis has decided upon the commercial value of 

 a given fertilizer, it is not just that the manufacturer loses 

 his reputation and his business because his manures fail, or 



