On Superpliosphate of Lime. 
327 
sieve, and the lumps then be spread about two inches thick on a 
hard floor. A small garden roller should then be drawn over 
them backwards and forwards unlil they are flattened to a uniform 
cake. If the workmen now work this cake with a fine garden 
rake, thev will find \hat the tough mass will crumble be:ween its 
teeih. I dwell upon this, because I think we ought to make it a 
rule in the use of all artificial manures, by bringing them into a 
state of powder, and mixing them thoroughly with dry mould or 
ashes, to spread them so uniformly in the soil that each rootlet of 
the future crop shall have as fair a chance of finding its portion of 
food as if liquid manure had been used. 
Havina: tried the method described above, I venture to recom- 
mend it to farmers ; but I consider it by no means a perfect pre- 
scription. It is not clear whether the second fermentation 
should be allowed to take place or not. It is by no means clear 
that the proportion of acid (one-half the weight of the bones) 
might nut be diminished. It is doubtful whether the amount of 
bones, 4^ bushels, be the right dose per acre. It is very likely 
that Phosphorus should not be administered singly, but should 
be combined with potash, as Dr. Liebig advises. These are 
points which I beg to recommend to our members for their future 
inquiry. 
Before concluding, I must mention a process long known in 
this neighbourhood, which seems curiously to agree with Dr. Lie- 
big s treatment of bone-manure. Mr. Brooks, of Hatford, has for 
many vears assured me that he could make four bushels of bones 
go as far as twentv bushels by mixing them first with peat-ashes. 
It occurred to me that since many peat-ashes contain sulphate of 
lune, this practice might be a self-taught form of the recent 
scientific discovery. Following his instructions, I mixed eight 
bushels of crushed bones with sixteen bushels of our brick- 
coloured peat-ashes, and the mixture was thrown up in a heap. 
In a few days they began to heat violently, and the heat lasted 
for about ten days, at the end of which time on opening the heap 
scarcely a particle of bone could be detected. The whole was 
reduced to a fine reddish grey powder. The fragments of bone 
which still showed themselves were exactly like those which sul- 
phuric acid has acted op. On tr\'ing this compost bv the side of 
Superphosphate with a crop of turnips the efiect was precisely ihe 
same. W hether the cause be the same, one cannot of course be 
certain, until a chemical analysis has been made. The ashes 
cost only Ad. for two bushels, the acid would have cost five times 
as much. The trial, therefore, will be worth making for those 
who have bog-peat at hand ; though peat varies so much in its 
elements that there can be no certainty of success. If it fail, 
there v,ill be nothing lost; if it answer, it may be useful, in Ire- 
