Farmers' gazette, and Cheraw advertiser. (Cheraw, S.C.) 1839-1843, October 20, 1841, Image 1
* <QM33ilW
?^ CHkRAW, SOUTH-CAROLINA, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER flO, 1841. NUMBER 49.
By WT ?AC IiEAHT. |
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From the Journal of the Royal Agricsl oral So.
cioty.
Experiments on Nitrate of Soda and
Saltpetre.
T W. RTRATFORB DoUSDALK, M. P.
Many communications have been for.
warded to the society on the value of
saltperrc and nitrate of soda as manure?,
perhans the result of an experiment I have
rnndo upon two fields of wheat, eight j
^ miles distant from each other, mav not I
r he ?inint*re>tiu;. One field is of a light j
gravelly soi' which was manured with a j
coat of nV;?r| in the autumn before the :
wheat was sown. The other field is of a I
stiff clayey so l, and wns manured with i
lime in the autumn, \hout the middle
of las' \pril I measured off three quarters
of an at re in the field of gravelly
soil, and *nwed one quarter with saltpetre,
one wirh nitrate of soda, and left the
remaining quarter with uothing but the
raarl. *
I also measured off four quarters of an
ere in the clayey field, and sowed one
quaner with saltpetre, one with nitrate
of sod;-, cue with soot, and left the remaining
quarter with lime only. In both
cases the quantity of saltpetre and soda
was as one hundred weight to the acre.
In the gravel!) field "the produce of the ,
quarter of an acre with nitrate of soda j
was, of?
Wh?t*t 13 Nu. 2 pk*. weighing 63J lbs. pr. bu. 1
fitftiw 9 p.wl. 72 lbs. '
Cluff RiiU
was re. 2 qrs. 27 lb*.
S ah pure,?
Whe tt 10 Ik; 21 pk?. weighing 64) lb* pr bu.
8ir*w 8 cwi. bb lb*.
Chaff and
w nt?, 3 qrn. 24 lb*.
Marl only,?
Wheit 10 h? 2 pk*. weighing 64 Ibe. pr. bu.
Straw 8 cwt. 54 lbs.
Chaff and
waste 1 cvrt.
In the clayey fHd:?The produce of half an
cm, m inured with?
Nitrate of soda,
wheat 18 bu. I pk, weighing 64 pr. bu.
Do. with salip--tre
17 hn. 2 pka. weighed 53 pr. hu.
Do. with root 17 bu. 1 pk, weighed b3} pr bu.
Da with hm? on.
ly 16 hu. weighing 62) lb*, pr. bu.
a fn thin experiment my bailiff did not
^ measure I ho quantities ot straw and
waste.
I also sowed some soda and saltpetre,
to the same amount per acre, on some
gram-land.
I was not at home when the hay was |
cut; but am informed that the crop was
greatly increased, particularly by the ni.
trate of soda.
From the S. C Temperance Advocate.
Nbwbrkky Agricultural Socieby.
As the Agricultural Society of New.
berry District has elected me one of the
Committee to report on the raising of
Wheat and Potatoes.
I comply with their requests, first on
Wheat. Wheat requires its own natu.
ral soil, which is red land. Though it
may be raised on sandy soil with clay '
bottom, if well managed. 1 would prefer
old land to raise wheat on, and it manured
with cotton seed, as it is much the
w 9 |
easiest applied to the land, and I believe i
it to be as good a manure as we have for i
raising wheat. My mode io raising is '
something like this. To sow corn land, j
I gather oft' my corn as soon as it will!
hear it; then pasture the stalk field, un- '
til it is clean. I then cut the stalks and i
sprout the land ; and about the middle of j
October, commence sowing my blue stem j
or any other late wheat. Mv manner in I
scatt< ring cotion-seed, is to lay the lands
ofF'-'O feet wide, if you art very careful
you may sow ti?e deed out ol tne wagon,
whilst i\ is g-'ing along the land. But if
care lie >u>r taken, it will be thrown in
piles. ! have sown in this way, and had '
it well put on the lann ; and I have had
them tiirown in piles, ana lifted in busk- j
ets, and scatter in that way. The j
amount of seed per acre, is a matter:
which depends very much on the strength
of the lan! sown. This is a matter farmere
will have to judge for themselves.
But I will give my opinion on the subject.
Land that would produce ft bushels per
aero wlt.iai: manuring, would produce I
? (,
double lite amount with 25 bushels of cotton
seed per acre. 1 prefer wheat being
ploughed in w.l. a narrow shovel, and
tnat well don?. And as your land is
ploughed, have it followed with hoes, j
chop round the trees and stumps, also all j
the the corn roots and turfs of grass if any;!
leaving the ground perfectly smooth.?
This plan I consider far letter than
brushing or harrowing.
I would pursue the same plan in early
as in late wheat, only sow it later. The
I first or middle of November. I will give
I you my views about the smut, which is
very disastrous among us. Remedy.?
Soaking with a solution of bluestone will
certainly prevent it. You should prepare
yourself with a tight vessel, and in I
it put 3 pounds of bluestone, and as much
water as will be sufficient to cover 6
bushels of wheat, and let it soak 24 hours,
when this is taken out, put in 2 pounds 1
more of bluestone, and add a little more
water for waste, and stir well your 6
bushels again, and so on. What you
soak in one day you sow the next. Ex.
pcriencc lias taught me this i* a sure and
infallible remedy. ( sow about one bush,
el to the acre generally; thick sowing
prevent* the rusts. I am of the impression
that tne thrush machine was the
first, and is the genera! cause of smut, for
I have sown the bluestem wheat for twenty.six
years in succession, and never
missed but one crop, and that was occasioncc
by the fly, and in a!! that time, I
never had one grain of smut that I perceived.
I pursued the old Dutch rule. I hall,
cd My w.ieat to mv barn ami trod out
with my horses a?d threw it with my
shovel fo: the purpose o cleansing it.
And tor 8'ed, I took the head of it.?
S find it well with the seive, and I never
had the occasion of using biueitone nor
any other remedy. I let others have of
my seed, and they soon complained of
smut. L'ist year 1 had a thrasher built, :
and thrashed my wheat for the first, and
I sowed a few lands of my bluestcm without
soaking, and it had the smut for the
first time.
I have raised for the last three years,
some of what is called the red spring i
wheat, and 1 am very much pleased with <
it. I soaked it and made a fair trial. We
lackec about two lands of finishing the
field. That was sown with seed unsoaked,
and it was perhaps one fifth smut, the
other that was soaked in bluestone I never
saw the first grain of smut. <
I have tried scvral kinds of wheat, i
and the old biucstem and red spring ]
wheat has proved the most successful I
with trie. i
SWEET POTATOES. <
The best plan of raising sweet pota- <
toes, agreeable to iny experience, is as I
follows:
Some warm spell in March, I would i
say, about the m.ddie. Take your seed I
potatoes from the stack, sellar, or where
they have been preserved during the win. .
ter. Sort out such seed as you would
like to plant, end bed them in fresh earth,
some potatoes and some earth, until you have
as many as you need. Then leave {
the bed exposed to the weather until
planting time. In so doing, the potatoes '
will sprout. Prepare your ground, which 1
should be sandy soil if you have it. Old 1
land is host if manured. Cowpen land is '
preferable. Any other manured land !
will do, except hog pen. 1 have tried f
hog.pen and hog manure three times and ,
it has failed every time. The potatoes <
will come up very bad, and directly begin |
to fire, and finally die. You should ,
l? Mil ?
plough your grouno oy tne miuaie ui <
March, and continue to plough it about <
every ten days until the 15th or 20th of I
April; then check your land three and a i
half feet, and make your hills small, then
raise your seed carefully, about three in <
a hill. I believe cutting the potatoes in
small pieces to be injurious. Plant them
whole. If you should wish to plant in
ridges, cut a channel on the top of the
ridge and lay in it a potatoe every 10 or
12 inches. Planting at this season, the
potatoes will come up in a few days, and j
grow finely. Whereas, if planted early
thcv will not.
When they want work, plough and |
draw up-dirt with a hoe. Which of those |
two plans is best, I cun hardly say, nl- ,
though I believe the ridge will make the <
most, hut the hill the largest. i
I have planted yam potatoes for seve- I
ral years, and generally bed my seed in 1
March. In doing this, I scrape a little '
of the surface off about 2 inches, and !a\
the potatoes thick on the ground, and
cover with the soil very light; plough
your patch as before directed, until the
piants come up from 4 to 6 inches high.
When there is appearance of rain, make
as many ricges as you have plants for.? ,
When you get a season, set your plant* ,
in as you would cahbage or any other
plants, 10 inches apart, and as the plants
become large enough, set out as before
'' ? ? * ? ! - .1 Ml L-! ._|
Girecieu i oeueve mey wui nnng n ujierahlo
good crop, when planted as late as
the 4th of July. i
But the sooner the better. Sometimes
however, we get no seasons, and can
hardly raise them in this way. There- 1
fore, [ have tried planting them in this
way. Therefore, I have tried planting
them in the hill and ridge as other potatoes,
and have been successful in raiswg ]
them in this way. I raised the largest
ones last year I ever saw 5 they weighed ,
as high as seven and a half pounds. I
have the red, Spanish and the yam ; the
red grows large, but of them all, I think
most of yam. The
next is how to preserve them during
the winter. I have tried several
plans, and the plan most successful, is in
hill or stack. Scrape out a hole about
4 inches deep, and as round as you well
can, large enough to hold 25 or 30 bushels
; then place heart pine hoards in the
bottom; then pine straw, a good Inyer
under and over the potatoes. Then
stand corn stalks very close all around
the straw. Then cover with dirt. The
stacks should be covered so as to keep the
rain and cold from them. Perhaps I
should say something about the time and
manner of digging! The. vine# ahould
he well frost bitten before digging, and
1 am of the impression that they ought
to be let stand several days after frost.?
The potatoe hull or peeling will harden
very much by sranding, and the potatoe
is not half so apt to bruise and injure in
putting awav, and I believe if the potatoe
vines were all cut off as soon as frost hit.
ten, it would be an advantage to the potatoe,
for when the vine is frost bitten,
the sap is inclined to run back to the potatoe,
and if the vines were cut off, it
would prevent the sap s returning. The
pointoe would be dryer, and perhaps not
rot so soon.
My common mode of gathering them
is with the plough, first dragging t> e,
vines awav, then plough the hill or ridge
followed with hoes.
IRISH POTATOES
are a potatoe that I have nev?;r planted
largely, although I raise cnougo tor my
use. I generally plant them in Febru.
nry, and have manured with several
kinds of manure. Stable, cotton seed,
rotten straw, and hogs ha.r, the last
named, (hogs hair,) I believe, excellsall
others, dry as it seems to he.
GEORGE BOZEY.
July 22d, 1841.
Driving Nails into hard Wood.?
We have lately seen anoti.er experiment
of d iving nails into hard seasoned timber
tairly tried. The first two nails, after
passing through a pine board, entered a.
lout one inch, and then doubled under
ihe hammer; but,on dipping the points
of the other six or eight nails into Inrd,
ivery one was driven home without the
least difficulty.
Carpenters who arfe engaged in repairingold
buildings sometimes carry a small
lump oflard or tallow for this purpose on
one of their boots or shoes.?New Genesee
Farmer.
a NEWLV.discovered salt 8priitg.?
A salt spring has beep opened in the town
of Galen, county of Wayne, (N. Y.,) aIxiut
fifty rods fro in the Erie canal, on the
land of the Rev. Dr. Judd, of Ithaca, with
the fairest prospect of the best of brine,
and even of the fossil salt, as is evidenced
hy compaiing th" borings in Europe and
the late boring near Abingdon in Virginia,
with the report of the engineer employed
at Galen. The diameter of the
tube bored is 4 inches, and 280 feet deep,
fhe vein is strong, and continues to run
profusely over the tube, destroying nil
vegetation within its reach. It is un.
commonly pure, producing the finest salt
without the use of lime. % The brine is
forced up by the ga? with a violence known
no where else.?Rochester Dem.
Some Notices of the recent Experiments
made in the Propagation and growth
of Plants, in Charcoal. Extracted
from the translation in the Garden
Magazine, from the u Gorton Zeitungers
Since the publication of Liebeg's Organic
Chemistry, charcoal seems to have
become a more important substance in
vegetation, and to possess more valuable
properties than heretofore has been supposed.
Recent experiments in Germany
h ive resulted in placing it as one of the
most important agents in the propagation
of plants, which has ever been dis
covered. The theory of its operating
has been explained by some of the
German writers, which we shall have
occasion to notice in our remarks.
Believing the subject to be one of
importance to all cultivators of plants,
we have devoted a few pages to a notice
of the experiments which have l?een
made in Germany, and which are, j
at the present time, attracting attention
in England, by the publication of several
articles translated from the " Garlen IZei*
tune' ot vermanr. in the GardenerVJ/.i
gazine. |
The discovery of the method of grew. I
ing plants in charcoal was first made by i
M. Lucas, an assistant in th- Royal Bo.
tanic Garden of Munich He olwerved
several plants in the hot-house, that, '"ce
plunged in charcoal ashes, [tho dust,) or
the refuse of charcoal, showed an extra*
ordinary vigor of growth, as soon as t ley
had pushed their roots through the hole^
in the bottoms ofthepots, into the'charcoal
Among other plants which exhibited this
rigorous growth so strikingly, was the
Thunhergia aln.ta, which ripened its seed
without impregnation. M. LucasJ^trucks
with the ap'^earanceof the plants, thought
* i.
it would he well to follow up the experi.
ment: this he did by adding a proportion
of charcoal powder to the usual mixt soil,
in which plants were already rooted, and
also bv using it pure for cuttings, instead
of sand. Weshall divide the subject into
three parts, viz:?Propagating Cuttings
in Charcoal?Charcgal as amixtuic with
earth?and the Theory of its action on
Vegetatioh.
Propagation in Cutting Charcoal.?M.
Lucas, before proceeding with a record of
his labors, describes the mode in which
his beds were prepared for the insertion
of the cuttings. He states that small
boxes are suspended in the front part of a
bed, [on the inside.) in the hot-house,
which bed is warmed by means of a tube
of sheet iron, instead of tan. The boxes
ha\pe gjazed sashes foLf.overt; in one of
these boxes he made the first experiment.
The charcoal used for the purpose wns,
fir, [pine.] the refuse of which, being too j
fine to be burnt may he had in anv quan- i
lift/. It is siftod through a coarse
sieve. to separate the large pieces that are
usually mixed up with it, and is then used
without further preparation. The charcoal,
he remarks, is better if it has laid ex- 1
posed to the influence of air and weather j
In the propagating box, it is laid only j
four inches thick in the bottom, as a deep, j
er laver would prevent the access of heat. |
c! arcoal, as is well known being a bad
conductor. Thus prepared, the cuttings
were put in. Cuttings of the following
p!aplaced in charcoal rooted in right J
to fourteen days *? Ciiiniiorbia fulgens
and piofa, lo?.mse a purge, n id I. suoorbs.
Hnkea mierocarpn, Lolndiin nietn. Thumbergia
alata. Lvcestria formo**. JV'os re- j
ligiosa and pcndola, Begonia f.u folia, |
saguinea, and dipelain, Tfon? olum ?na.;
jus fl. pl? and several o hcr plants. Cut-;
tingofthe Cacti familv planted in cba* j
coal, were particularly succpHsful : of
some hundred specimens thaf had be u
dried for some days previously *? h? r.u- ,
about twenty succeeded pe fed among
them were some echinocact uses rrn meretuses,
and mamillaries, mat v of them fr-.m j
ene and a halfto three inches in diameter.
Cereuscs and epiphyllums rooted readily,
and in this short space of time the roots j
of many of the species were six inches ,
long ; other succulunt plants rooted quick- J
ly.
In from a fortnight tojthrec weeks the
following, very difficult ot propagation :
?Piper nigrum. Aster tomentous, Mimosa
Houstoni, Barlerin, hvstrix, Alnus
barbisa, and ninny others.
In from three to four weeks Croton
adenophvlla, Dracaena humblis, Pandunus
amarvllidifolius, and several others.
In from six weeks to two months, a
few exceedingly hard plants to grow, rooted
in the charcoal.
These being the first experiments, some
of which did not succeed well, allowance
must be made for the newness of the method,
and other circumstances attended upon
resorting to new systems.
M. Lucas was also highly successful in
rooting leaves and parts of leaves of varimiM
nlnnfA. Home of which were the fol
I ? - ?
lowing:?Lophosperrnurn scnnden, Con.
lamen indicuin, Sinnigia guttata, gioxima,
<kc.
It will be teen that many slow rooting
plants have been more speedily rootedthan
by the ordinary method of propagation,
and we trust that future experiments,
conducted with care by our amateur gar.
deners, will show more particularly its re.
suits.
Application of charcoal as a mixture of
earth.?The success which attended M.
Lucas in his mode of inserting cuttings in
charcoal, induced hiin to try it for another
purpose, vie., using it as a mixture
witn various sorts of earth. It here also
showed its extraordinary effects, by the
luxuriance and more pefect development
of the plants; it was particularly the case
with tuberous rooted plants.
A bed appropriated to the growth of
seedling plants in pots, plunged in charcoal,
was cleaned out and made ready!
for the reception of a lot of arums, begon- j
ias, gloxinias, &c. : the pots were plunged I
in tli?* charcoal to the run. and the sur- i
face of the soil covered with loose mould '
from a dung bed. These tubers soon ;
shot up vigorously, but owing to the frame !
being wanted whore it was intended to I
remove them in the summer, tiiev were :
allowed to rurnnin. The plants absorbed i
a great deal, and needed water every day,
When the pots were taken up in the fail,
it wa9 found that the roots had grown
over and under the pots, and penetrated I
into the charcoal and grown so strong i
that it was absolutely necessary to replant j
the iubers in fa-ger pnls. Charcoal was j
of course mired with earth in repotting, I
in the proportion of rather mora than one J
half. Every plant soon showed extraordinary
luxuriance under ihis treatment;
some were particularly rich in t it
r?scence, the foliage darker, a i the
period of the duration of the dower- unusually
long. Some small tubers f?*o?n >
* ' - * - f . I
which no flowers wore expectea tno its: ;
year, flowered beautifully. 6* no t'icti1
grew beautifully, and sever. ri. \J*;
icau euphoibidK shower! ; r
The application of chitrcoal ? '-ti*.
of sickly trees, was not U s? su c .'.I. .
M. Lucns states that an or.?nge ti e vtl?.'
yellow leases, having had a ?.?>e? of ilinr.
coal laid on, after the surface soii was re- j
moved, soon recovered its vigor; and this i
, was also the case with gardenias. Of the i
quantity to be used, there is no particular
rule: half charcoal may be used without
injury, observing only that it has been exposed
to the influence of the weather for
some time, and the large pieces removed:
watering must not he neglected, as the soil
is rendered more porous, and the moisture
pusses off rapidly.
Many other experiments were tried,
such as sowing seeds in charcoal : ferns,
sown directly on the surface of a pot of
charcoal, vegetated quickly and well.
M. Lucas observes, that his employer,
the court gardener, M. Seitz, acknowledged
the importance of the use of charcoal,
and will practise a number of systematic
experiments upon plants in the open air,
in ordea that a " well grounded opinion on
the application of charcoal ashes in general
can ne formed."
Theory of M. Lucas's Experiment on the
Effect of Charcoal in Vegetation.?Dr.
Buckner has published an account of the
theory of M. Lucas's experiments in the
"Garten Zeitbng," the substance of
which we give beiow, the original article
occupying several pages. The experiments
of M. Lucas, detailed above, are
thought by Dr. Buckner to be very important
contributions to vegetable physiology
and dietetics, and his remarks are
made wifh a view to introduce a clear
scientific notion of the effects of charcoal
on vegetable life. These effects are
founded, undauntedly, on several laws,of
which the following appears the most im
porta nt.
1 Ahsorbtion of light and generation
of heat.?It is well known that bodies re
ceive the light of the son more perfectly.
?he darker, duller, and looser thev arc.
and the consequent development of heat
is in proportion of light. As charcoal
dust is one of the darkest, dullest, and
most porous bodies, it must, on account
of its peculiar capacity of receiving the
sun's light and changing its heat, be parli
ularlv favorable to vegeteble life.
*2. Absorption of atmospherical air.?
\ iiiong ull porous bodies that have the cajistcii}
of absorbing gases and vapors,
charcoal has been proved, by numesous
experiments, to bold the first rank. Modcrn
physiologists are, for the most pari
of opinion that plants can receive no solid
nourishment from the earth, that is, thai
every thing they can assimilate (or digest]
must be in a liquid and gaseous or vapory
state. If we, therefore; meet wi hsolici
ous earth, chalk, magnesia, oxide of iron,
in short such substances in plants as could
only be received from the soil, we ma)
always consider it certain that these sort,
of matter can only he absorbed by the
roots in proportion as they are in a fluid
or dissolved state in the soil. These sorts
of matter, and particularly the different
organic salts which we find in the ashes
of vegetables, are not actually to be considered
sources of nourishment; but stimulants
to assist in digestion, as salt and
spice are to the higher animals and man.
In connection with the subject Dr.
Buckner introduces a treatise by M. Payen,
read before the Academy of Sciences
at Paris, on the 8th and 14th October,
18H9, vizThat charcoal operates as a
condenser, under the influence of water,
on the constituent parts of the air, in the
manner as spongy platinaon the elements
of detonating gas ; so that nitrogen and
oxygen are dissolved, and. mixing with
wuter, are absorbed by the spongioles, and
carried to the cambium for assimilation.
This property of condensing the air, and
making it fit to be received bv plants,
does not exclusively belong to charcoal;
but charcoal powder appears to possess
this power in trie highest degree, consequently,
besides light and heAt, is capable
of carrying to the roots both air and water,
i. e. nitrogen, hydrogen and oxygen,
in the greatest abundance.
3. Decomposition of the charcoal, and
formation of a nourishing substance for
plants.-?For a long time it was generally
believed that charcoal, as an inanimate
body, incapable of decay, contii juted in
no degree to the nourishment of plants,
and (hat charcoal dust cojld only serve
at most to make the earth looser and
warmer. But M. Lucas found from his
experiments, that the charcoal, in which
plants grow, by degrees undergoes dicomposition,
and at last becomes a sort of
humus. This obviously takes place
merely because the charcoal dust acts as
humus, and with the co-operation of water
and air. continually gives out to the
plants oxid-J of charcoal, or carbon ite.
together with the saline particles which
are in the charcoal and remain in the ashes
after burning. But to prove this, some
i i *
cnemicai experiments were necessary.
4. Comparative chemical exa mina
of charcoal dust.?The more perfectly to
establish the theory of the effect of charcoal
on vegetation, M. Lucas gave me
for examination.
i. 1st. Ashes of fir [or pine] charcoal, in
which no plant had grown.
2d. Ashes of fir charcoal, in which
plants had been grown for half a year.
[This was used for most of the experi.
ments.)
3d A portion of charcoal dust which
M.id been used for another purpose for
years [to till up a bed for plunging in
p!
Witn these materials Dr. Buckoer
mnde rhe following experiments, which
we extract entire :?
Two drachms of them were reduced to
fine powder, and digested in three ounoes
of distilled water for twepty-fou# hours.
All the three quanfitise filtered off from
the charcoal, were urn o ored, and left the
test appear unchanged. A'terthe evaporation
of the water, there remained only a
very trifling yellowish residura of a saltish
taste, which acted somewhat like an
alkali, and, besides potash, contained also
chlorine. No difference could be distinguished
in the case between a. b. and c.
The portions of charcoal powder to
which water had been applied, were craoh
separately dgested in a sand bath that, a
three ounces of water, to which a drachm
of corrosive lie of potash was added. * The
liquid filtered from a was almost colorless,
and was not the leasi|muddy when saturated
with muriatic acid. The liquid from
b was brownish, and. with muriatic acid,
yielded 0.40 grains of huinic aridTwo
drachms of each of the three portions
of charcoal were reduced to tubr*
in the platina crucible. The ashes of a
weighed twenty-two grains, and lost, by
shaking with distilled water, one grain ?a
weight- The ashes of b yielded only
nine grains of ashes, of which only half a
grain was dissolved by the water# The
ashes of c, on the contrary, weighed thirty-three
grains; apparently because the
charcoal powder, while in use for two
\ years, had become fouled with garden
mould : of these thirty.three grains of ashes,
two grains wore dissolved in water.
The constituent parts of the three persons
of ashes retained their qualities; so that
in the dissolved parts were found potash,
chalk, carbonic acid, sulphuric acid, muriatic
acid, and phosphate. The portion
indissoluble in water contained chalk,
magnesia, traces of oxide of iron, carbqnnte
acid, phosphate and silicic acid.
If the objection be made, with respect
to these three portions of charcoal, that
ihcv arc not all from the same tree and
might therefore yield a different weight of
ashes, we may, with probability, suppose
that this natural difference is very inconsiderable,
as the charcoal was all of fir
wood from the neighborhood of Munich,
whore limestone debris is the general un
1 dersiralum of the Woods.
The result is quite decisive and nndispitted,
that diluted lie of potash scarcely
' ever dissolves any thing from fresh fir
: charcoal, and that, on the contrary, char)
coal in which plants have grown, being
partly changed into humus and this be.
ing drawn out by diluted lie of potash, a
mounted in the charcoal 5, after six
I months use, to 2.25, and in the charcoal
r c. after being two years in use, to 3.76 of
' 100. By this it is also proved, that char1
coal, under the influence of light, of air,
water, and vegct .tion, is gradually decern*
1 posed, by losing carbon; in the place of
which hydrogen and oxygen predominate,
1 and concur with the reisuiu* of carbonate
\ lo form humic acid.
No less interesting is the further com.
parison of the ashes of virgin the charcoal
a and the charcoal which had been used
halt a year for vegetation; in this
instance a and b were in the pro,
portion of 122 to 75 of ashes from 1000 of
1 charcoal. Undoubtedly the dissoluble
salts were, in pioportion to the increasing
decomposition of the charcoal, absorbed
1 by tha roots. Thai the greater weight of
' the allies of c is not decisive, has been al
ready rnenfioued. To make very correct
experiments of this sort, charcoal from the
same tree should be burnt, equally reduced
to powder, and, in planting in this
powder, nil impurities of garden mould,
| &c., carefully avoided, and watering the
, plants with rain water attended to.
5. Antiseptic powder of charcoal.?
j Theantisceptic powers of charcoal are of
| gnat importance,, for it has very little
power|of retaining water, and the little it re'
tain* is partly absorbed by the roots and
I partly evaporated. This property dei
servesthe greates attention ifgardenera in
respect to the recovei.ng the health of
plants, the roots of which have become
injured by being in a clayey soil, and too
freely watered or after continued rein, or
being in conatct with manure not sufficiently
decomposed. They should be immediately
transplanted into charcoal powder,
as the most effectual method of cure.
In concluding this article, which we
hnve condensed as anon as possible, and
i that the sumo time preserve all the nc?
i cessary information, in order that mr
readers may understand the experiments
and he able to repeat them, we cannot lie
recommended the trial of experiments bv
our amateur cultivators of the use of cbaicoal,
in propagating plants, as well as in
renovating sickly and diseased ones. No
1 particular care is necessary, nor arc wo
aware that there is any material difference
in the qualities of charcoal: oak, maple
and pine are often brought to market together,
and may be obtained in mixture,
or may lie separated and used by themselves
after they have been powdered. Ai
we understand it, the only care is to powder
and sift the charcoal, using only the
dust, which may be put into a box onpot.
as is usual with common soil, and the
cuttings inserted.; We shall institute
some experiments ourselves, and give the
results in our pajres. Those of our friomls who
may adopt M*. Lucas's plan, will, we
trust, keep some record of their operations
and send us an account of them. A list
of the p'ants experimented upon.?the
length ot time which they required to root,
and other particulars connected with
tbeir|fQ.<th,wou'dbe n er ting, and far.
Dish some data by which others might be
. guided in further experiment ?Horlitmi* ? .
tural Magazine.
?-?