New York State }frsEUM. 5] 



ject. Whether the suggestions of the geologists quoted would be 

 sustained by a scries of systematic experiments apparently 

 remains undecided. 



[n reply to inquiries concerning the value of peat and marl 

 as fertilizers, Dr. Collier, director of the State Experiment 

 Station at Geneva, lias kindly sent me the following- letter : 



New York Agricultural Experiment Station, ) 

 Geneva, N. Y., Sept. 16, 1891. i 

 W. B. Marshall, 



N. Y. State Museum, Albany ■, N % Y. : 



My Dear Sir. — Iu reply to your favor of the 16th inst., I would 

 say that, so far as I know, little has been done by the Experiment 

 Stations in testing the qualities of freshwater marls and peats, although 

 we have used carbonate of lime, of which fresh water marls are mainly 

 composed, and peat, as top-dressing for some of our lands, with imer- 

 esting results. There is no question, I think, as to the value of both 

 these in changing the mechanical condition of soils to which they Are 

 applied and iu that way having a great fertilizing value. The peat also 

 furnishes to soils comparatively poor in organic matter these substances. 

 I would refer you to page 168 of our Ninth Annual Report for certain 

 results which seem to be due to the application of finely divided car- 

 bonate of lime. We are repeating this experiment this year. 



Thanking you for calling my attention to the matter, I am, 



Sincerely yours. 



PETER COLLIER. 



The report cited by Dr. Collier contains the following : 



" In studies of sugar cane and sorghum soils the observation has 

 been made that a good proportion of lime in the soils or in the fertili- 

 zers applied usually accompanies a good sugar crop. With the view 

 of obtaining information on this point, one-half of each row of sorghum 

 was top-dressed, as soon as planted, with crude precipitated carbonate 

 of lime at the rate of 4000 pounds per 'acre, and from the arrangement 

 of the rows, this made two limed strips running across the field with 

 intervening and adjacent strips without lime. In regard to yield of 

 cane and time of maturity, there was no notieeable difference between 

 the strips, and the yield of seed it was not possible to determine. 

 Analyses of juices from forty canes (twelve varieties) of like maturity, 

 twenty from the limed and twenty from the unlimed strips, showed an 

 average of ten per cent more sugar in the canes from the limed strips; 



