The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1884-03-26
IgrirnhnraL
T. H. aOsKINs. Newport. VT. Editor.
A Minister on Fertilizers.


"Mr. Editor IL have noticed in your
articles formulas for making phosphates,
as good as Bradley's, at 800 per ton. Now
most of us have been bumbugged good
many times. What we want is the thing
itself. If it can be done, the persons to
do it are the ones who have faith in it.
Most farmers are not expevimenters. What
I want, and most of us want, is that you,
or somebody else, make a phosphate as
good as Bradley's at $50, or even $35 per
ton, and we will buy it of you by the
thousand tons. Here is chance for
some shrewd Yankee to make fortune.
l do not believe the farmers are fools.
They use good phosphates because they
pay. If, now, any one will give as good
for less money, he will get the trade.
What we need is not formulas, but the
thing. We can soon find out whether it
is as good as others or not. DR.. Cutting
can do no such service to the state as by
giving us not a cheap formula, but
cheap fertilizer. AS long as the thing is
not furnished, we doubt if it can be. 1
am interested, as buy three tons at S44
per ton. E. j. RANsLow.
Wells River, March H."
REMARKS BY THE AGRICULTURAL Ed,
IToR.-We are sorry to be obliged to de-
cline the request of our reverend friend
that we should engage in the manufacture
of fertilizers for his benefit We have
already business enough on our hands
that suits us better. We are sorry he has
been "humbugged so much, and, under
the circumstances, perhaps it is not 80 very
strange that he should imagine that we
are trying to "humbug him again. We
feel honored that he should read, even
cursorily and carelessly, what we have
written recently upon the subject in ques-
ton. If he had read more attentiveiy he
would know that we have been urged to
this writing by other readers, and we
hope he will believe that we have been
animated by honest and unselfish motives
in stating our own experience in the mat
ter, and in our replies to the questions of
our correspondents. He will pardon US
for saying that his request appears trife
unreasonable. He is a minister, as we'll
as farmer, and may have at some time
prayed for particular blessings at the re-
quest of his brethren. Would he not
have thought it rather harsh, having done
so, if one of those brethren had said :
"What want, and most of us want, is
that you, or somebody else, will bring us
these blessings you have been praying for?"
Now we, as an editor, are obliged by
our duty to our readers to respond to their
requests for information to the best of
our ability. We have done so, and in
this matter of fertilizers we have given
them list of the materials of which they
are made, with the wholesale market
prices affixed. We have told them where
these materials were to be had, and the
usual prices of freight; and we have told
them, in those Objectionable formulas"
how they may be mixed together to form
fertilizers that would have the same con-
stituents as those sold by dealers, in about
the same proportions. We have shown
that this may be done at a saving over the
usual cost of such goods. We have called
to our aid in this matter the best science
of the time relating to the subject. We
have shown that in England (although
there they are made in great part of ma
terials imported from America) CONNER
cial fertilizers are sold to farmers at not
much more than half what is charged in
this country for inferior goods.
In doing all this, dear Mr.. Ranslow, we
have said nothing against your, or any
one else's, right of purchasing the fertil-
izers of Mr.. Bradley, Mr.. Bowker, or any
other maker, if you think that is the best
thing to be done. 1t is hardly necessary
to say that every farmer has perfect
right to reject our information, or that OF
MIR. Ward, or of MIR. Burleigh, or of the
Connecticut, or the New Jersey, or the
Massachusetts experiment stations. aud OF
the many other eminent agricultural
chemists, upon whose Investigations and
statements our articles have been based
Every one has the entire right, as free
born citizen, to reject all this, and to be
lieve it "humbug," and to 60 off and buy
all the Bradley" or any other "phos
phate," that they want.
AS to the farmers being fools, we sup
pose that minister, or any other man, is
no more of fool before he learns. Greeh
than he is after he has learned it. And sc
a farmer is not fool because he does no
know the composition of fertilizers, o.
where the materials are to be had, and a
what price. Nor is he fool for wanting
to know, nor is an editor humbugging
his readers when he answers their reques
for information to the bes of his ability
II is not question either of foolishnes