86 — 
largest quantity, as they have an average ash content of 
about 13.5 per cent., against 5 per cent, in the stems ; the 
ro'ots and seed have but little, both the percentage of ash 
and its content of chlorine being small. 
I have one sample of red clover grown under conditions 
identical with those under which one of the alfalfa samples 
was grown, and is therefore comparable with it. The 
clover contains 10.07 per cent, ash, with only 2.5 per cent, 
chlorine ; while the alfalfa hay grown under the same con¬ 
ditions has 10.42 per cent, of ash with 6.53 per cent, of 
chlorine. , , «*. . . . 
According to E. Wolff as quoted by Mayer in his 
Agrikulturchemie, red clover ash contains 3*95 P er ^ent., 
and alfalfa ash 3.48 per cent, of chlorine; while E. Wolff, in 
his ash analyses, gives 2.57 for the percentage of chlorine 
in alfalfa ash from plants in bloom. The difference betvveen 
these determinations may be accidental and I regret that I 
have not enough of the sample to either establish. the fact, 
for instance, that alfalfa does require more chlorine for its 
proper maturing than clover does, or that this result is an 
accident. As it is the result is suggestive only. It ought to 
be remarked here that alfalfa does better throughout this 
country than clover does, although good crops of clover 
can be grown here. I never saw a finer specimen of red 
clover than the one used in this determination. The 
chlorine may have a very important function in die devel- 
opment of alfalfa, and hence its large amount, this may 
may not be the proper explanation, but it is evident that the 
ordinary method of preparing the ash gives too low results 
and, after allowing for differences due to differences of 
soils, we have differences due to the degree of maturity ; 
but in all the samples the percentage is high. I have found 
but few analyses that are nearly as high. Wolff gives three 
with 6.97, 7.00 and 8.05 per cent, chlorine. Harrington, in 
Texas bulletin No. 20, also gives three, with 5 -° 7 > 6.90 
8.57; while the average percentage in the ash of alfalfa hay, 
as we have found it, is 7*85 P er cen t-, with 10.88 per cent, 
as a maximum and 4.20 per cent, as a minimum. 
The sulphur was determined and estimated as sul¬ 
phuric acid. That some of the sulphur may escape as sul¬ 
phuretted hydrogen on dissolving the ash in hydrochloric 
acid, is a well-known and an almost hackneyed obseivation. 
As the albuminoids which may contain sulphur are abund¬ 
ant, and also as the alfalfa is a lime loving plant (its leaves 
containing an abundance of calcic sulphate), the sulphur 
seems to promise as great a loss as the chlorine. As my 
time did not permit of an extended series of experiments in 
