After he got through questions were asked, and one man asked Mr. Hedges this question, "How far north he would consider it safe to plant the native walnut or butternut?" Hedges looked around with disgust and said, "I would go into the forest and find the tree and I would not plant it any further north than God Almighty intended it." That was a very good answer. You will find on the Missouri River growing there the box alder and the elm and the cottonwood and there I have only recommended to plant these three varieties. I don't think it necessary for me to say anything about varieties. Mr. Plumb has given you the names. One word about ornamental and useful trees. I shipped in a carload of spruce trees years ago and set many of them a rod or two apart where I intended to have a fence, and after that put in Whitney's No. 20, and where the 20 failed put in some other kinds, and I am planting most of my trees in that way now, in thick rows, and am now using that for fence posts. Some say people will go along and steal the fruit. Let them steal it. They are ornamental to the farm and they are useful. By keeping a lath protection around them one year I have very little trouble in keeping them. I presume there is not a man here this afternoon but has ornamental trees all around his premises and likes to see them.

I am like Mr. Plumb, I think a great deal of the hard maple. The people at Trempealeau had a cemetery that needed to be adorned. Mr. Wilcox, the old gentleman, said if the people would get up a festival and raise the money to put in ornamental trees he would furnish the trees. I told him that people would remember him longer by that than by anything else. Such a thing will perpetuate our memory better than any other act we can do. I guess I have taken my time and Mr. Tuttle's too.

Mr. Tuttle I have very little to say on ornamental trees but I think if I had an interest out on the treeless plains of Colorado and Dakota, I should think most any tree was an ornamental tree. I always had a preference for the elm in the city. In fact I came from what is called the City of Elms. I think any tree that will compare with the elm is

an extraordinary tree. The maple has too close a shade. It ought to be trimmed out higher than it ever is. The beauty of the elm is that it goes up and you have the light. As maples are generally set they are trained too low. Now I had once hard maple trees standing close to the house and I had to cut them down. Of course the maple is an ornamental tree, and this hackberry that is grown in La Crosse is one of the very best of trees. I would prefer it to the maple. An ornamental tree depends upon what you want it for. If you have but a line you want a variety of trees. No one tree can produce the right kind of an effect. Then the soft maple ought never to be planted. I don't know what Lombardy poplars are planted for unless for the lightning to strike. Poplars planted in my city sometime ago are now being cut down. Elms planted at the same time are beautiful trees now. I never saw a tree that would compare with the elm. In the city of New Haven the elm trees form one of the most beautiful of sights. I would say that that I have seen a tree that was planted in New Haven over 200 years ago. The first minister there after Davenport the people agreed to build him a parsonage, and the whole colony came in to give something towards it. One man, the poorest man in the colony, had nothing to give but brought two elms and set them out in front of the house. After 200 years those elms are still standing while the offerings of all the rest have gone to decay. I never found any trouble with elms except the red elm. That will kill in the top. It should not be set as an ornamental tree. I know in early times I used to cut the red elm and I never could find one sixteen inches in diameter that was not dead in the top. I came to a man setting a red elm and I said, Why do you set that tree? I said, the top will become dead. The tree is there yet but it will not endure with the white elm. I have trees of the white elm that I set thirty years ago and I never knew of one being killed. I have seen trees with limbs broken off, but that could be avoided if trimmed when young. It cannot compare with the soft maple though in the breaking off of limbs. In New Haven where they have

set out elms they have set all elms. In our city there is no uniformity. Many of the trees after a few years are worthless. Every man who comes from the city of New Haven is proud of it, and because of its elms.

President Smith - Ladies and gentlemen, we must close this discussion and postpone our going to Mr. Loudon's on account of Professor Armsby who has to go to Madison to night.

Prof. Armsby-Ladies and gentlemen, the subject assigned to me by the secretary is a pretty broad one, and as he left me no special instructions, I suppose he left it to my discretion as to the branch I should take up. There are a great many things to be said about fertilizers; a great many ways in which they may be looked at. If I should take up too many things it would take too much time. I wish to give you a very short talk upon simply one aspect of the question, and that is the best way of buying them; and by fertilizers we mean those that are known as commercial fertilizers, those that are much more valuable than manures on the farm. Theseare not used, so far as I know, to any great extent in this state at present. I have no doubt that the use of these concentrated fertilizers will rapidly increase. There are all the indications of an increase of demand for them among market gardners and others. The first question is, what do you buy fertilizers for, and what do you want to do with them? There are three things upon which the value of a fertilizer depends-nitrogen, potash and phosphate. I do not need to detain you with any discussion of these substances. These three substances give value to the fertilizers. Phosphoric acii is contained in them in three forms. What is called the soluble, the insoluble and a third intermediate one which, while it will not dissolve in water, will dissolve in soil more readily than the insoluble. Some of the most common substances furnish these ingredients. The most common sources of nitrogen are three, salt of ammonia, and the various forms of animal sources such as dried blood and the tankage of slaughter-houses. The phosphoric acid of these fertilizers is almost always furnished either in some form of bone or some form of native phosphatic rock such

as the phosphate of South Carolina. The potash, finally, is usually found in some form of commercial potash soils, which are mined in Germany very extensively.

Now, as I said, in buying fertilizers you buy them for the sake of the nitrogen, potash and phosphoric acid they contain. But how shall the farmer to whom the names are a little bit of a mystery, who is not familiar with the different sources of these three elements, how shall he buy these fertilizers intelligently? You need to know, in order to buy them intelligently, how much of these materials, to be valuable, must be contained and how much to pay for it. The only way to find the value of a commercial fertilizer is to have an analysis of it. There are very cases where we can tell the value by simple inspection. Most materials used as fertilizers, but especially mixed fertilizers, containing a number of things ground together, are very liable to great adulteration. A poor fertilizer may smell just as bad as a good one. The only way to tell a good fertilizer is to have an analysis made of it. As to the second point, as to what to pay for it, there too it is necessary to call in the aid of an expert. In the east, in the experiment stations, it has been made a part of their business to find out what they can be bought for in the market. For instance the substance nitrogen. Every year it is endeavored to be found out what the retail price of some source of nitrogen, as nitrate of soda, is. They find out the price and about how much nitrogen it contains. From this data it is very easy to find how much nitrate of soda you have to get to get a pound of nitrogen. Last spring it was found you would have to pay about 18 cents. To get enough sulphide of ammonia at retail to furnish you a pound of nitrogen you would have to pay about 18 cents, and so on through the list. They have published this information in a little table, a table of estimated trade values, showing what is a fair price per pound for these fertilizers. Having this and also an analysis of the fertilizer we are in a fair condition to know what is a fair price for that fertilizer. Suppose our fertilizer contains 10 per cent. of nitrogen and 4 per cent. of phosphoric acid. Then we get 200 pounds of nitrogen

in a ton of the fertilizer. The 200 pounds of nitrogen would cost, to buy in the same market, 200 times 18, and so in a ton of the fertilizer there is $37 worth of nitrogen. Of the 4 per cent. of phosphoric acid which is worth, say about five cents a pound, 80 pounds will be worth $4, that is beside the $37 of nitrogen in the fertilizer.

By means of such an analysis and valuation you have the means of knowing whether the price asked is a fair one or not, and no man who buys any quantity of fertilizers and purposes to make money on them should neglect to have their value determined in this way and should hold the manufacturer to account for selling goods to him at a fair price. Of course very few farmers in the country can afford to pay for chemical analyses, and so to meet this point experiment stations have been founded in several of our states. In several states this was the primary object of the stations to give farmers a place for analyses of this kind. It is fortunate that in Wisconsin we were not called upon to do this work too exclusively. At the same time we desire to do this work so far as time will permit, and if any of you are intending to buy fertilizers do not fail to determine its value by such means. We can determine the amount of valuable ingredients in the fertilizer and can tell you with a fair degree of approximation whether the price is a fair one. We cannot tell exactly but we can tell within five dollars a ton probably, whether the price is a fair one or not. Then, just a few words in regard to the best method of buying this material. I have been talking about this in a general way, but not in a particular manner. In the first place, buy goods of this sort of large manufacturers, This kind. of business requires honest, straightforward dealing, because the business is done on a very small margin. There is such a competition and such a strict oversight kept upon the business that there is very little liability to being cheated by dealing with respectable places of business. In the second place do not trust the manufacturer too much. Be sure that his fertilizers are as good as represented to be. Every reputable manufacturer will guarantee that his fertilizer contains so much of one or all of these valuable ele