Answers to Queries, and Queries. 



251 



us (Eric, of Agr. § 2504.). This, we hope, will satisfy R. W., and we may 

 take this opportunity of assuring him and all our readers, that every improve- 

 ment or discovery, whether foreign or domestic,, made since the printing of 

 our Encyclopaedias, shall regularly, as they appear, be brought forward in 

 this Magazine, which, as we have before stated, is intended as a perpetual 

 supplement to our other works. 



Mushrooms, In answer to a complaint by S. W. R., that mushrooms 

 grown on Oldaker's plan are frequently tough and bad-flavoured. ". The 

 manure for the beds should be in a moist state, well worked and 

 sweated before introduced into the house for making up ; — the beds 

 are made in the usual way. Let them remain till the heat is quite 

 gone out of them, when they should be spawned and moulded up with 

 fresh maiden earth to the depth of 5§ or 4 inches, and let them stand with- 

 out water till the spawn is working freely, when a good supply should be 

 given, and the beds kept regularly moist so long as they continue to pro- 

 duce mushrooms. By the above treatment, they may be obtained as fine 

 as from the old method or from the natural pastures." (G.) 



Tyrolignous Acid. — In answer to G. G. of Sheffield, as to the mode of extracting 

 this liquor from wood, we have taken the following from " Monteath's Forester," 

 published in 1822. The kind of coppice- wood used is chiefly the spray, or brush- 

 wood, and any species of tree or shrub will do, excepting those of the pine and 

 fir tribes. In the neighbourhood of Glasgow, where there are extensive works 

 for its distillation, it sold in 1819 at from 11. 2s. to 11. 10s. per ton ; where there 

 are no public works, the following apparatus may be erected, and the liquor sent 

 to any distance in casks. 



The boiler {Jig. 67 a.) must be of cast or malleable iron, and should be from 

 five to seven feet long, three feet wide, and say four feet deep from the top of the 



arch, built with fire-brick. The wood is split or round, not more than three 

 inches square in thickness, and of any length, so as to go into the boiler at the 

 door. When full, the boiler door (6) is properly secured, to keep in the steam j 

 then the fire is put to it in the furnace below, and the liquid comes off in the pipe 

 above (rf), which is condensed in a worm, in a stand (e) filled with cold water, by 

 a spout (f), and empties itself, first into a gutter below (g), and from that it is 

 let into barrels, or any other vessel ; and thus the liquid is prepared. One English 

 ton weight of any wood, or refuse of oak wood, will make upwards of eighty gallons 

 of the liquid. There is also a quantity of tar extracted, which may be useful in 

 ship-building. The pyrolignous acid is used by bleachers and calico-printers, 

 and by chemists for making a transparent and very superior domestic vinegar. 



Doub Grass. — " Sir, — In the eleventh volume of the Asiatic Rsearches, 

 Captain D. Richardson gives an account of what he calls the Doub grass of 



