218 
Annual Report of the Consulting Chemist. 
Peruvian Government agents at one uniform price ; and as 
the importers refused that samples should be taken and the quality 
of the various cargoes ascertained before the purchase was made, 
it is not surprising that the sales of Peruvian guano in England 
have fallen off very much indeed during the last twelve months. 
Many agriculturists have justly lost faith in the superiority of 
Peruvian guano over other artificial manures ; and, in my judg- 
ment, they are fully justified in declining to buy guano on terms 
which do not offer a reasonable guarantee that they receive a fair 
equivalent for their money. 
The whole guano business is at present in a very unsatisfactory ' 
state, and as the contract between the Peruvian Government and 
their present agents in this country terminiites next August (1872), 
any arrangements which the new contractors, Messrs. Dreyfus, 
Freres, and Co., of Paris, or their agents in London, Messrs. J. 
Hy. Schroder and Co., may make hereafter, are not in operation 
at present. There is, however, every reason to believe that 
the Peruvian guano which will be offered in future, when the 
Government sales in this country are undertaken by the new 
contractors, will be of a very superior character. 
If the Peruvian Government agents in this country are in 
a position to reassure the public that their importations will 
consist of guano of high quality, there can be no doubt that the 
sales will soon become as extensive as they ever were. Both in 
the interest of the importers and the consumers, it is to be hoped 
that in future no guano will be brought into the market and sold 
as best Peruvian guano, which, like many samples of Guanape 
Island guano examined by me in 1871, is wet, pasty, and com- 
paratively poor in ammonia ; but that all the guano which is 
offered for sale as best Peruvian really possesses the superior 
properties which characterised the former and now exhausted 
Chincha Islands supplies. 
The importation of a dry light-brown coloured guano, rich in 
ammonia, is of vital importance to the agriculturists of all coun- 
tries ; for whilst phosphatic fertilizers are constantly being dis- 
covered, and no fears exist that the supplies of phosphatic rocks 
and minerals which are found in enormous quantities in various 
parts of the globe will ever be exhausted, the sources from which 
ammonia can be obtained are limited. Hitherto Peruvian guano 
has been one of the main sources for the artificial supply of 
ammonia, with which the farmer enriched his fields ; and, con- 
sidering the present high price of sulphate of ammonia and all 
nitrogenous fertilizing matters, the farmers of England umjues- 
tionably will welcome and highly appreciate the importation of 
guano possessing the characteristics of that of the Chincha Islands. 
It affords me, therefore, much giatification to report that the 
