AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENTS. 237 
Colombo, 8th March, 1880. 
Srr,—In the ‘‘ Journal of the Chemical Society ” for 
February, among the extracts from foreign journals, 
there are a few that should interest an agricultural 
community. 
‘‘Experiments on the Manuring of Barley, by P. 
Wagner and W. John (Bied. Centr. 1879). The soil in 
which these experiments were carried out was a sand 
containing 14 per cent of humus, the phosphate being 
applied in the following experiments one day before, and 
the nitrogen (in the form of Chili saltpetre) the day after 
sowing. The following table shows the quantities of 
manure applied per hectare and the yield obtained.” I 
may mention that a hectare is equal to 2°47 acres and a 
kilogramme to 2°2 lb. 
Corn. Straw. 
kilos. kilos. 
(1) Unmanured... w- 4420 3770 
(2) 20 kilos nitrogen »-- O200 4890 
(3) 50 kilos soluble phosphoric 
acid... ae ... 4570 4490 
(4) 50 kilos soluble phosphoric 
acid with 20 kilos nitrogen... 5320 4920 
(5) 50 kilos phosphoric acid 
in the form of freshly precipitated 
phosphate of lime and 20 kilos 
nitrogen... Me: ... 5600 5110 
(6) 50 kilos soluble with 43 
kilos insoluble phosphoric acid in 
form of phosphorite with 20 kilos 
nitrogen... ae pas SHAY, 5370 
(7) 35 kilos soluble and 30 kilos 
insoluble phosphoric acid as above, 
with 20 kilos nitrogen ... 5660 5350 
(8) 50 kilos soluble phosphoric 
acid in form of phosphate of potash 
with 20 kilos nitrogen... nOlTO 6500 
Turning to Johnstone and Cameron, we find that barley, 
_ the subject of the foregoing experiments, contains the 
following ash constituents per 100 parts :— 
Barley grain Barley Straw. 
with husk. 
Potash... oe 21°28 sss ae 19°32 
Lime ... ay 2°40 oe my] 7°00 
Phosphoric acid 33°17 Nice atid 4°83 
Barley seed contains 14 per cent of nitrogen. 
The abstracter goes on :—‘‘It is evident from the above 
experiments that although the soluble phosphoric acid 
yielded poor result, the use. of saltpetre proved very 
advantageous. The reason of this may be looked for in 
the fact that the soil was so very poor in lime, as not 
