ate agricultural college or school; and no Legislature shall, by contract, express or implied, disable itself from so doing.

SEC. 9. That the grants of moneys authorized by this act are made subject to the legislative assent of the several States and Territories to the purpose of said grants: Provided, that payments of such installments of the appropriation herein made as shall become due to any State before the adjournment of the regular session of its legislature meeting next after the passage of this act shall be made upon the assent of the governor thereof duly certified to the secretary of the treasury.

SEC. 10. Nothing in this act shall be held or construed as binding the United States to continue any payments from the treasury to any or all the States or institutions mentioned in this act, but Congress may at any time amend, suspend or repeal any or all of the provisions of this act.

OBSERVANCE OF THE FERTILIZER LAW.

List of manufacturers who have paid licenses as required by the fertilizer law and of the fertilizers which have been thus licensed for sale in the State during the year ending December 31, 1888:

Bradley's X L Superphosphate.

Boston, Mass. B. D. Sea Fowl Guano.

Potato Manure.

Bradley Fertilizer Co.,

Cleveland Dryer Co.,

Coe, E. Frank,

High Grade Superphosphate.

New York, N. Y.

Unicorn Ammoniated Superphos

Cleveland Superphosphate.

Cleveland, O. Cleveland Potato Phosphate.

Glidden & Curtis, Boston, Mass. Soluble Pacific Guano.

NOTE. No samples of Homestead and of Common Sense Fertilizers could be found in the State, and hence no analyses have been made of these brands.

INSPECTION OF FERTILIZERS.

During the past year the Station has drawn and analyzed one hundred and thirty-eight samples of licensed fertilizers.

In order that the analysis of a fertilizer may be of value, it must fairly represent the average composition of that fertilizer. Great care is necessary in drawing a sample for analysis, to get one that is a fair sample. In this State a sampling tube is used that takes a section or core out of the entire length of the package, and thus insures fair sampling. In addition to this precaution, the State law required the past year the analysis of at least three different samples of each brand, so that the average of these may be taken to fairly represent the general character of the fertilizer. All the samples analyzed in 1888 were drawn by the director of the Experiment Station, either in person or by deputy.

EXPLANATION OF TERMS.

The following explanations of the meaning of the terms used to designate the valuable ingredients of fertilizers, is taken from the last report of the Station for 1887. This repetition seems advisable as this report will fall into the hands of many who have not the last one.

The ingredients of commercial fertilizers upon which both their agricultural and commercial values chiefly depend, are nitrogen, phosphoric acid, and potash. Besides these more valuable ingredients, sulphuric acid and lime are always present in superphosphates in considerable quantities, being a necessary accompaniment of phosphoric acid as it exists in all fertilizers.

Nitrogen is the most costly of the three important ingredients mentioned, and adds largely to the commercial value of all the fertilizers sold in Vermont. It is found in the wholesale markets in quite a variety of substances which are used to supply this ingredient to mixed fertilizers, but which are available for fertilizing purposes when purchased unmixed with anything else. Organic Nitrogen is the nitrogen of animal and vegetable tissues. The following materials furnish organic nitrogen to fertilizers: Dried

blood, dried and ground fish, azotin and ammonite (prepared animal matter), fish scrap, meat scrap, cotton seed meal, castor pomace, horn, hair, wool, leather-waste, etc. These substances must decompose and the nitrogen become changed into compounds of nitric acid and ammonia before it is available to plants. There is, therefore, a great difference in the value of organic nitrogen as found in the above-named materials. Dried blood, for instance, decomposes in the soil rapidly, while horn, hair, wool and leather scrap, decay very slowly, and the nitrogen which they contain becomes useful only after a long period of time. These latter substances are not only less useful to the farmer than blood, fish and meats, but they are also much less costly, and their presence in a fertilizer supposed to be manufactured of the best materials is good evidence of fraud. Compounds of ammonia and nitric acid also occur in commerce, the former in sulphate of ammonia, the latter in nitrate of soda. Seventeen parts of ammonia, or sixty-six parts of pure sulphate of ammonia, or eighty-five parts of pure nitrate of soda, each contain fourteen parts of nitrogen.

The phosphoric acid of superphosphates is determined in three forms according to its solubility in various liquids, viz.: Soluble, reverted and insoluble.

Soluble phosphoric acid is that which exists in fertilizers in a form freely soluble in water. It is obtained by treating certain phosphatic materials, such as bone and South Carolina rock, with sulphuric acid (oil of vitriol). The advantage of having the phosphoric acid of fertilizers rendered soluble, is not that it remains so in the soil, for it becomes insoluble in water very shortly after application, but in the fact that when the compounds of the soil change it back to insoluble forms it becomes deposited in particles so minute that they are easily appropriated by the roots of plants.

Reverted phosphoric acid is a term that originally signified phosphoric acid that had once been "soluble," but which from some cause had "reverted," or "gone back" to forms insoluble in water. Now it is used to designate that which is dissolved by a solution of ammonium citrate, and includes not only the truly reverted, but also more or less of phosphoric acid as combined in the original, undissolved phosphatic material. Reverted phosphoric acid, in so far as it comes within the strict meaning of the term, most probably has a value for crop production, equal to that of the