Ferry, Thomas

WHITE, statesman; born at Mackinaw, Mich., June 1, 1827; afterwards resided in Grand Haven; was a member of the State legislature (1850) and senate (1856); member of Congre (1864-71); U. S. Senator (1871-83); was several times president pro tem. of the Senate, and became acting Vice-President of the U. S. (Nov. 22, 1875), on the death of Henry Wilson. Died October 14, 1896. NATURAL FERTILIZERS. Of the fertilizers provided by nature, guano has long been one of the most valuable. This is the result of the droppings of birds for ages on certain oceanic islands, together with fragments of their foods and their dead bodies. It occurs in many localities, but the richest known bed is that of the Chinch a islands, off the coast of Peru, which are situated in a rainle region, and thus retain the nitrogen and phosphorus of their guano much more fully than other guanos. This deposit is practically exhausted; but guano of inferior condition is obtained from various other localities.- Nitrate of soda exists native in Chili, as part of an earth called caliche or terra salitrosa -perhaps the result of a former guano bed. It is abundant in quantity, and contains from 50 to 75 per cent. of the nitrate, with a considerable proportion of common salt. It is exported under the name of "Chili saltpetre."-Phos phates. Of phosphatic fertilizers, the most abundant sources are the phosphate rocks of South Carolina and Florida. Those of South Carolina cover an area of 70 by 30 miles but are most acce ible at a radius of about 8 miles from Charleston, where they are largely worked. The beds of Florida also yield an abundant store of this valuable fertilizer. The rock known as apatite , a phosphate of lime, is also employed to some extent for fertilizing purposes. Of other natural F. may be named coprolites, or fo ilized animal excrements, of which con sider able deposits exist in some localities; gypsum , or sulphate of lime, which supplies soils with lime and sulphuric acid, of use principally for their indirect action on the insoluble constituents of the soil; salt , which has its value as a stimulant; marls , the green-sand or glauconite beds which occur near the U. S. seacoast, from New Jersey to Louisiana, and which contain potash and phosphoric acid; and kainate , potash salt derived from the salt mines of Sta furth, Germany. ARTIFICIAL FERTILIZERS.-These are made from various kinds of organic waste, and also from the natural F. A valuable one, from the amount of nitrogen it contains, is fish guano , obtained both from fish refuse, and from fish taken from the sea for direct conversion into this material. Other nitrogenous fertilizers are the skins, horns, flesh, bones, blood, ., of cattle and other animals, which are largely worked into fertilizers in South America, where numbers of cattle are killed for their hides alone. Poudrette , or human excrement, is a fertilizer largely used in France, and in smaller quantities in some other countries. For ages this fertilizing material has been returned directly to the soil in China and Japan, and has gone far to keep the soil of those countries in a constantly rich state. Phosphatic blood guano is a moisture of dry powdered blood with di olved bones, potash and soda. Such vegetable refuse as cotton seed, oil-cake, the waste from breweries, starch and sugar works, ., is also used for fertilizing purposes; while of the phosphatic fertilizers one of the chief is made from the bones of animals, which are rich in lime phosphate. These are used in the form of bone dust, or are treated with acids, which change their phosphate into superphosphates, which are very beneficial to pastures and to crops cultivated for their roots or tubers. Wood ashes contain about 5 per cent. of potash; and unleached ashes, from timber grown on strong soils, contain still more. Such ashes are also rich in lime, phosphoric acid, silica, magnesia, and iron, and are very useful as fertilizers. Leached ashes have no potash, yet their phosphoric acid gives them a value as plant food. See AGRICULTURAL CHEMISTRY.