164 
SOUTHEBN CULTIVATOR. 
of the ground to be improved — on the surface or area, to 
be gone over — and on the quantity of lime or manure one 
may have at his command. In the use of amendments, 
there is no precise rule of action. Cultivated common 
sense is the best guide in all such cases. Fertilizers that 
we once applied with a shovel we now apply by the hand^ 
fid. At that time and place, they were cheap and plenty; 
now they are high and scarce. 
Both air slacked lime and leached ashes are valuable to 
be mixed with lot manure, heaps of decaying leaves, straw 
and corn stalks. Caustic ashes and lime should never 
come in contact with the dung of animals. The action of 
either on leaves, corn stalks and straw, separate from the 
dung of animals, is beneficial. The alkalies facilitate the 
solution of the silica or flint in the stems of all cereals, and 
the rotting of the tissues of all plants. To convert wheat 
straw and corn stalks into a pulp for the manufacture of 
paper, they are boiled in lime-water. Such pulp takes on 
putrefactive fermentation readily. Coarse vegetables, and 
half formed mould in the earth, need caustic lime to break 
down their stubbornness, and render their elements solu- 
ble in water, before either can nourish valuable crops, and 
secure the rapid growth of agricultural plants. 
In reference to the manufacture of soap, if rosin cost as 
much per pound as potash and grease, no one would ever 
have thought of putting it into soap to improve its quality. 
But when chemists told all reading soap-makers that the 
exudation from pine trees, whether turpentine or rosin, 
would form something like soap with the alkalies potash 
and soda, this cheap and almost worthless kind of soap 
was thrown into the market. A little rosin or turpentine 
mixed with either tallow, fat or oil does little or no harm ; 
and the manufacturers of good bar soap use from 25 to 35 
per cent of resin melted with the grease. We make excel- 
lent soap for family use from the refuse grease of the 
kitchen, without resin, or any foreign ingredient. Per- 
haps a plain statement of both the art and the principles of 
soap-making will be useful to some of our readers, based 
on the abiding necessity of having this important detergent 
to cleanse soiled linen, and for personal ablution. 
THE ART AND PRINCIPLES OF SOAP-MAKINO. 
It is a law of nature that no inconsiderable amount of 
oily and saline matter shall daily exude through the skin 
of a person to soil any garment that may be in contact 
with it. This creates the necessity of frequently washing 
under-clothing, and suggests the propriety of preventing 
by ablutions, the accumulation of perspired substances on 
tlie surface of the body. It is wrong to use strong soap, 
for it does serious injury to the skin ; and only a little 
mild soap is required. But to remove grease and dirt 
from soiled linen, the case is different. One needs good 
soap ; and good soap always has an excess of the alkali. 
Indeed, water slowly decomposes soap, and renders its 
oil or fat insoluble. The white, milk-like color of soap- 
suds arises entirely from the separation of oil from the pot- 
ash or soda, and its insolubility when thus separated. So 
long as the chemical union between the alkali and oil is 
perfect, no milkiness or precipitation is seen. It is the free 
alkali in hot soap suds that takes grease away from the 
dirt, in soiled linen, and thereby facilitates the speedy re- 
moval of both. As the alkaline base ©f soap is the active 
ingredient, the question arises : Why not use caustic pot- 
ash, soda and ammonia, dissolved in water, as detergents, 
in place of soap 1 Because the oil or grease serves to 
neutralize in the first place, and mask in the second, the 
too intense causticity of the alkalies named. But. since 
commercial soaps are so shamelessly adulterated, the use 
of lye for washing is largely on the increase. Lye may be 
formed from common wood ashes, or from potash and 
soda as sold in the market. To separate carbonic acid 
from potash in wood ashes, in pearlash, and in carbonate 
of soda, caustic lime is indispensable. The principal art 
in making soap is in the difficulty of getting pure potash 
lye. The soluble carbonate of potash obtained from wood 
ashes makes either no soap at all, or an inferior articles 
after long boiling. The acids in tallow, fat and oil parti- 
ally decompose the carbonate in soap-boiling in this 
wise: The oleic, stearic, or megaric acid, as the case may 
be, takes half of the potash away from the carbonic acid 
to form soap, which, in chemical language, is an oleate, 
sterate, or magarate of potash, or soda. The carbonic 
acid set free unites with the moiety of proto-carbonate of 
potash still undecomposed, and converts it into Z>i-carbca- 
ate of potash. 
At the South, where little lime appears to be used in 
domestic soap-making, common soap is a mixture of the 
super or bi-carbonate of potash and an oleate of that base. 
For all economical purposes, it is worth only half price; 
but even that may be cheaper and better than to pay a 
dollar a bushel for quick lime. To get good lye, we mix 
a peck of recently slacked lime to a flour barrel of ashes. 
The lime ought to be near the bottom of the ash-hopper 
and mixed thoroughly with the ashes. 
Lime so used is not injured for putting on land. 
By using soft water, boiling hot, or nearly so, one can 
have lye strong enough to make soap with little boiling. 
Indeed, the per centage of water one may have in soft 
soap is almost arbitrary ; an excess, however, favors its 
decomposition. Potash soap, if made hard by evaporation 
will attract sufficient moisture from the atmosphere to be- 
come soft again. The principal advantage of using pot- 
ash instead of ashes for making soap is in having strong 
lye without the trouble of boiling. We never saw any 
one weigh either potash, lye, grease or oil, in making 
soap ; as any one familiar with the business can easily 
tell whether more grease, or more lye is needed to take up 
any excess of either that may be exhibited in boiling. As 
soon as ebulition ceases, grease wdll rise caid swim on the 
surface. It is light colored ; while lye is almost black, and 
sinks to the bottom. An instrument indicates its specific 
gravity (Beaume’s hydrometer). A lye of 18 degrees of 
this measure has a specific gravity of 1.138 which is equiva- 
lent to 15 per cent of potash, or 12,8 per cent of soda, al- 
ways supposing the lye to contain no other matters or 
salts, to influence the hydrometer. 
Some ashes yield so much of the sulphates, phosphates, 
and chlorides of potash, soda and magnesia, which are 
soluble, as to be nearly worthless for making soap. Caus- 
