OFFICIAL INSPECTIONS 29. I3 



"My potatoes I say nothing about, only ten bushels from two 

 rows 25 rods long." And again : ''The company wants me as 

 an agent but I won't swindle the public." Further on he says : 

 "You will see by my letter that it is no use to come up here." 



Under date of December 7 the company sent a copy of a 

 letter claimed to have been written by the president of the Em- 

 erson Piano Company of Boston, in which he gives an account 

 of a good yield of corn obtained by the following treatment: 

 A coating of manure was placed over the land before plowing. 

 On planting a small amount of INIineral Fertilizer was placed 

 in each hill. The season was dry and cultivation was carried 

 throughout the season. Many of the stalks bore four and some 

 five perfectly developed ears. This is another instance in which 

 Mineral Fertilizer did not prevent the growing of a crop with 

 good cultivation when the land had been treated with farm 

 manure. If this corn, and corn that will produce four and five 

 perfectly developed ears to the stalk would have been sure of 

 winning a prize, was exhibited at the New England Corn Show 

 at Worcester it has not come to the writer's attention. 



As stated above, it is lawful so far as the fertilizer law is 

 concerned for this company to sell this material under the 

 claims that they do that it is free from nitrogen and contains 

 a trace of the two other constituents of commercial fertilizers 

 that are required by law to be stated on the package. If the 

 fertilizer law were as broad as the food and drug law these 

 goods would be mislabeled if accompanied by such statements 

 as are made in the literature which these people distribute. 



In 1910 the Experiment Station had about three acres at 

 Highmoor Farm on which oats were grown without fertilizer. 

 The object of this was to test the natural uniformity of the land 

 and see how well it is suited for plot experiments. It is planned 

 in 191 1 to use a part of this field in an experiment to test the 

 Mineral Fertilizer on potatoes and corn. Six-tenths of an acre 

 will be set aside for this purpose and laid out into six plots. 

 Two of these plots will be unfertilized, two will be fertilized 

 with Mineral Fertilizer in accordance with the directions for the 

 particular crop to be obtained from the New England Mineral 

 Fertilizer and Chemical Company, one of the remaining plots 

 will be fertilized at the rate of 1500 to 1800 pounds per acre 

 with a high grade fertilizer, and the other plot will be fertilized 



