254 SOILS, MANURES, &c. 
" w p ■ i r. m ii i i i n mu ■ ■ in n ■ ■nw ■ ' mm i » i t ■ ' ■ « nwn'umwi ■■■ — ■ » ■ w .i m— m mxHmmmmmu in wn 
The calcareous fait of lime being 
added in fufficient quantity to a fatu- 
l 
rated folution of fixed vegetable alkali, 
produces foap ley; the effedls of the 
lime are, to produce a more perfedt 
degree of caufticity, and a greater incli¬ 
nation to unite with fubflantial oils, with 
which the ley intimately combines and 
forms altogether a vifcous glutinous fub- 
ftance, containing the bafis of the true 
mucilage; therefore foap and foap-fuds 
certainly poffefs it in as perfedl a ftate 
as it can be prepared or produced by 
chymical procefs. But notwithfianding 
their excellence as manures, yet they 
are by no means proper for immediate 
application to delicate plants: it is true 
they enrich the foil, but until they have 
undergone putrefadlion, and their falls 
have had fufficient time to become neu¬ 
tralized by the acid of the air, they are 
I 
abfolute 
