n of caustic soda which diffuses most
rapidly, or the carbonate of soda formed by its speedy union with
carbonic acid, is removed from contact with the chloride of calcium.

Soda and carbonate of soda are more soluble in water and more strongly
alkaline than lime. They, therefore, act on peat more energetically than
the latter. It is on account of the formation of soda and carbonate of
soda from the lime and salt mixture, that this mixture exerts a more
powerful decomposing action than lime alone. Where salt is cheap and
wood ashes scarce, the mixture may be employed accordingly to advantage.
Of its usefulness we have the testimony of practical men.

Says Mr. F. Holbrook of Vermont, (Patent Office Report for 1856, page
193.) "I had a heap of seventy-five half cords of muck mixed with lime
in the proportion of a half cord of muck to a bushel of lime. The muck
was drawn to the field when wanted in August. A bushel of salt to six
bushels of lime was dissolved in water enough to slake the lime down to
a fine dry powder, the lime being slaked no faster than wanted, and
spread immediately while warm, over the layers of muck, which were about
six inches thick; then a coating of lime and so on, until the heap
reached the height of five feet, a convenient width, and length enough
to embrace the whole quantity of the muck. In about three weeks a
powerful decomposition was apparent, and the heap was nicely overhauled,
nothing more being done to it till it was loaded the next Spring for
spreading. The compost was spread on the plowed surface of a dry sandy
loam at the rate of about fifteen cords to the acre, and harrowed in.
The land was planted with corn and the crop was more than sixty bushels
to the acre."

Other writers assert that they "have decomposed with this mixture, spent
tan, saw dust, corn stalks, swamp muck, leaves from the woods, indeed
every variety of inert substance, and in _much shorter time than it
could be done by any other means_." (Working Farmer, Vol. III. p. 280.)

Some experiments that have a bearing on the efficacy of this compost
will be detailed presently.

There is no doubt that the soluble and more active (caustic) forms of
alkaline bodies exert a powerful decomposing and solvent action on peat.
It is asserted too that the _nearly insoluble and less active matters of
this kind_, also have an effect, though a less complete and rapid one.
Thus, _carbonate of lime_ in the various forms of chalk, shell