BULLETIN OF THE BUSSEY INSTITUTION. 73 
ordinary salt of ammonia that might have been contained in it ready 
formed, or, at the least, this remark would be true of the carbonate of 
soda. 
Five wide-mouthed glass jars (preserve jars) were charged each 
with a mixture of 760 grms. Berkshire sand and 560 grms. of garden 
loam that had been calcined in a muffle to free it from organic matter. 
Two buckwheat seeds were planted in each jar, Jan. 5, 1876; and the 
jars were watered with rain-water until the seeds had sprouted, and 
the young plants had acquired a firm foothold. ‘Thereafter the plants 
were watered with the solutions of peat above described until April 3, 
when the experiment was finished, excepting jar No. 5, which was 
watered with rain-water throughout the experiment. The numbers 
upon the jars corresponded with those of the solutions, as above 
given. The results of these trials are given in the following table : — 
The crop harvested April 3, 
2 1876, and dried at 90° to 100° C. 
The jar was watered with a ; 
solution of — Weighed | Grew to Had - 
grammes.| height. seeds. 
Leached peatin phosp. potash . 
Crude peat in phosp. potash . 
Crude peat in carb. soda . 
Leached peat incarb. soda .. 
Ban-wWater G5 8k 
7 
2 
3 
4 
5 
At no time during these experiments could it be said that either of 
the crops watered with the peat solutions were growing any better 
than the one that got nothing but rain-water, though the: plants in jars 
Nos. 3 and 4 were a shade better-looking than those in jars Nos. 1 
and 2: still, the slightly larger weights of the crops from jars 3 and 4, 
which were watered with the dark-colored solutions of peat in car- 
bonate of soda, taken in connection with the fact that only two plants 
were grown in each jar, goes to show that a minute trace of nitroge- 
nous food was supplied to these two crops by the solutions. But the 
trace of nitrogen thus supplied was hardly appreciable, and must have 
been exceedingly small. Practically speaking, it may be said, without 
hesitation, that the results of all these experiments point to the con- 
clusion that solutions of the Bussey Farm peat in alkalies do not 
supply nitrogen to plants. The only suspicion of doubt as to this 
matter arises from the comparatively small absolute amount of peat 
that was taken in each instance for preparing the solutions. Had a 
