THE USE OF PARIS GREEN AGAINST TIIE WORMS. 1-13 
impaired by the rains, but because dry poisons can, if necessary, be ap- 
plied without the aid of heavy machines, which cannot be drawn through 
the fields in very wet weather. Dry arsenical poisons, especially when 
mixed with diluents, are much less liable to injure the plants than when 
applied in liquid suspension. 
PARIS GREEN. 
The nature and effects of this poison are now too well and generally 
known among planters to need consideration. Planters have too often 
found in its use a path leading from threatened ruin and bankruptcy to 
be much influenced by theoretical arguments against it. A study ot 
its effects, based upon experience and experiment, whether upon the 
plant OT upon the soil, shows that no harm results from itsjudicious use.* 
Our expectations in first suggesting its use as a Cotton Worm destroyer 
at the Saint Louis meeting of the National Agricultural Congress, in 
1872, ami more confidently recommending it before the same body at 
Indianapolis, in 1873, have been fully realized by the experience of the 
past seven years. Complaints of its ineflieaey are readily traceable 
either to faulty application or to the use of an adulterated article. Its 
principal disadvantages are its great cost, often increased by the, ex- 
orbitant profits demanded by merchants, and the consequent temptation 
to adulterate or imitate the genuine article. 47 Its advantage over the 
other arsenical poisons, besides its undoubted efficacy, is that it is least 
liable to scald the leaves and cause the young bolls to shed. 
If used in liquid suspension the amount of the green to be distributed 
over one acre should not exceed one pound or be not less than half a 
pound. The former amount is that more generally used, but, taking 
into account the wastage and loss through rain or dew, the actual work- 
ing quantity per acre is not much above one-half pound. The generally 
accepted practice has been to take 1 pound of the green to each 40 gal- 
lons of water, which amount of water was sufiicient to go over one acre 
wnen applied from above in a moderately fine spray or rain. 
The great advantage of the improved methods of application given in 
this report is that they extend a given amount of liquid poison over 
more than three times the area w ithout loss of efficacy, and thereby re- 
duce the cost to less than one-third of what it hitherto has been. 
If the green were as cheap as the other arsenical poisons, this saving 
would be of little consequence; but, as the matter stands, it is of the 
greatest importance, as will be seen from the following computation : 
The price of Paris green in the South averages 40 cents per pound, being 
rarely lower, and in times of general demand reaching as high as 75 
cents or $1 per pound. We arrive at the cost of the wet application per 
acre by adding to the cost of the poison and admixture that of the ma- 
— *p 
* A discussion of this subject -will be found in a work by the writer entitled " Potato Peste," pp. 
69-75. 
