320 Quarterly Reports of the Chemical Committee, 1886. 
" By the same post we received the report of a sample sent by one of our 
customers to Professor Dyer, showing 7 • 84 ammonia, and on Tuesday we got 
one from Professor Sibson, showing 9 "91. We enclose both for your inspec- 
tion. If you will not accept these assurances that we have really sent you 
value, we will send down to take a fresh sample from yours. 
" We will do anything in our power you may wish to prove that we have 
really sent you good value. — We are, dear Sir, yours faithfully, 
<c « 
" P.S. — The enclosed we must ask you to return by first post, and hand 
stamped envelope. We should be quite willing for payment to stand over 
until the manure has had time to prove itself." 
Mr. Bomford next wrote to say that a sample had been sent 
to Mr. Smetham, of Liverpool, which showed, ammonia 3*15 
per cent., phosphate of lime 3 '56 per cent., and nitrate of soda 
21*20 per cent., and that it had been decided to take the mean 
of this and Dr. Voelcker's results. Dr. Voelcker, however, 
re-tested the sample, and finding no trace of nitrate of soda 
present, inquired how the samples had been taken, and hearing 
in reply that the vendors' manager had been allowed both to 
draw and to send off the reference sample to Mr. Smetham, it 
not even being sealed by the purchaser, Dr, Voelcker wrote and 
obtained from Mr. Smetham a portion of this sample, and found 
that it contained some considerable amount of nitrate of soda, 
and was very different from the sample first sent to himself. 
After this Mr. Bomford received the following letter : — 
"E. Bomford, Esq. August 13th, 1885. 
" Dear Sir, — Replying to yours of yesterday, under such suspicious cir-- 
cumstances we cannot blame you. 
" We can only add that we sold you the goods in all good faith, and if 
there was any tampering with the sample, it was without our knowledge or 
consent. — We are, dear Sir, yours truly, " " 
And later Mr. Bomford wrote : — 
"I still think did not know of the sample being tampered with, 
and that it must have been done by their manager who drew the sample, and 
who is paid by them on the basis of analysis, but of course I have no proof 
of this." 
Ultimately the vendors agreed to accept 15s. per ton delivered 
for the manure, on the basis of Dr. Voelcker's original analysis. 
The Committee have seriously considered whether they ought 
not to publish the names in this case, which appears to be a 
very bad one, and have only reluctantly abstained from doing 
so on account of the want of precaution on the part of the pur- 
chaser to secure the identity of the several samples analysed, and 
of the way in which he appears to have settled with the vendors. 
2. Mr. C. Mannington, of Park House, Northiam, Sussex, 
sent on December 7th, 1885, two samples of linseed-cake, upon 
which Dr. Voelcker reported : — 
