we 
BULLETIN OF THE BUSSEY INSTITUTION. 61 
of chemicals employed were used alternately, — the one upon one day, and 
the other upon the next, —a method which was afterwards discarded as 
being inferior to the method of using every day for these jars (or for jar 
No. 5) a mixture composed of equal volumes of the solutions of the two 
chemicals. 
A second set of experiments, made in the spring of 1876, was analo- 
gous to the foregoing (A. to F.), in that the jars contained the same 
kinds and quantities of leather or cotton; but, instead of mere sand, each 
jar contained a mixture of 760 grms. Berkshire sand and 560 grms. of 
calcined loam; i.e., garden earth of fair quality that had been calcined 
at low redness in a muffle, to destroy all organic matter. 
In a third series of experiments, sand from a dune at Provincetown, 
Mass., was employed in place of the Berkshire sand of the first series, the 
idea being to get a soil of different texture from the soils of the other 
series. In this series of experiments, as with the second series, three 
buckwheat seeds were planted in each jar, January 17, 1876. The results 
of all these trials are given in the following tables. Each of the crops 
was dried at 90° to 100° C., before weighing : — 
Each jar contained 20 grms. 
roasted Sheepskin and 1300 
grms. Berkshire sand. 
Each jar contained 20 grms. Sheepskin and 
1300 grms. Berkshire sand. 
The crop harvested 
Feb, 3, 1875. 
The crop harvested 
Feb. 3, 1875. 
Grew to Had |/Weig’d 
height. seeds. || grms. 
Grew to Had 
height. seeds, 
Sulphate of potash . : 0.190 6: 
Phosphate of potash . 055 : 0 060 
Rain-water ..... “ 3} 0.105 
Nitrate of potash. . P 0 190 
Nitrate of lime. . . 16 0.125 
Phosphate of potash 
and nitrate of lime . ; 0.250 
Phosphate of potash 
and nitrate of potash 
4(sm’l) 
0 
ot 44 5h 
0.530* | 12 13 13 0.080 Cal etete tt 
* Not yet ripe when harvested. 
+ Several of the plants in these jars wilted and died a month after the seeds were sown. 
The others were green aud unripe when harvested. 
Each jar contained 20 grms. 
Each jar contained 20 grms. Sheepskin, 760 grms. 
Berkshire sand, and 560 grms. calcined loam. 
The crop harvested 
April 3, 1876. 
The jar i watered 
Weig’d | Grew to Had 
grms. height. seeds. 
Phosphate of potash . ; 3// 3)// 44/7 
Rain-water .... : 445 5} 
Nitrate of potash. . ; 9410 123 
Nitrate of lime. .. 52 (OR Oem SP * 
Phosphate of potash 7 
and nitrate of lime . 9 9% 144 
roasted Sheepskin, 760 Berk. 
sand, and 560 calc, loam. 
The crop harvested 
April 3, 1876. 
Weig’d | . Grew to Had 
grms. height, seeds, 
0.700 
0.850 
1.950 
3.170 
3.060 
