BULLETIN OF THE BUSSEY INSTITUTION. 379 
yses of many other chemists, they bear emphatic witness to the general 
good quality of the Stassfurt muriate of potash of 80. When the 
_ lot was purchased from which sample No. I. was taken, the price of 
gold was 114}; hence the cost of the muriate in terms of American 
currency was three cents per pound, which would be equivalent to 
nearly six cents per pound for real potash (K,O). In sample No. 
II. the price of real potash was about 5} cents per pound, as has been 
stated already in the note on page 185 of this Bulletin. In the spring 
of 1875, muriate of potash of 80% was sold at about three cents cur- 
rency per pound in Boston, and at 2} to 23 cents in New York. At 
the present time (November—December, 1875) it is worth 2} cents 
currency in New York, and can be brought thence to Boston for } cent 
per pound. 
Ill. A sample of so-called “ Stassfurt potash salt,” sent to Thomas 
Motley, Esq., at the Bussey Farm in May, 1873, by a Boston importer. 
The sample was said to have been drawn from several bags. The re- 
sults of its analysis, given below, differed but little from those obtained 
on analyzing another sample, previously sent to Mr. Motley by the 
same dealer, that had been taken from a single bag. 
IV. A sample of “ Kainit,” taken from a ton of the substance bought 
in May, 1873, of a Boston importer, by John R. Brewer, Esq., of 
Hingham. ‘These samples contained, besides much chloride of sodium, 
an abundance of magnesium salts and some gypsum : — 
III. IV. 
POT as en wee gen » , OTE 7.53 
Matters insoluble in water. . . . . 6.08 5.54 
SRO Pe Lhe furs OS TOT 10.19 
Semamnovash (KO) i. es) ee ee 41.42 10.59 
[ Or, calculated as sulphate of potash . 21.12 19.58] 
Considered as potassic manures, Nos. III. and IV. were manifestly 
greatly inferior to the samples of muriate (Nos. I. and II.) previously 
described. At $40 per ton, the price paid for No. IV., each pound of 
real potash would come to rather more than 18 cents, to say nothing 
of the cost of handling the 1600 pounds of useless matters in each ton 
of the fertilizer, or of the risk that some of these extraneous matters 
(magnesium and sodium salts) might actually injure the crops to which 
they were applied. 
