Analysis.—This, perhaps, is not a matter of much practical importance to the planter. The best peanut soil and the proper fertilizer had been found out before an analysis of the plant had been made. Still there are some advantages in knowing what are the prominent elements that enter into the composition of this, or any other, cultivated plant, and an analysis is accordingly given.
An analysis made by Doctor Thomas Antisell, chemist to the Department of Agriculture at Washington, and published in the Report of that Department about the year 1869, gives the following as the composition of the Peanut plant:
In one hundred parts of the husk and nut taken together
| Water | 2.60 |
| Albuminous, fibrous matter and starch | 79.26 |
| Oil | 16.00 |
| Ash | 2.00 |
| Loss | .14 |
| 100.00 | |
In one hundred parts of the husk and seed separated:
| Seed. | Husk. | |
| Moisture | 2.51 | 2.61 |
| Albuminous matter and farina | 79.71 | traces. |
| Cellulose | 85.48 | |
| Ash | 1.77 | 11.90 |
| Oil | 16.00 | |
| 99.99 | 99.99 |
"The ash of the seed," it was stated by the same authority, "consists of salts wholly soluble in water, composed of the phosphates of alkalies, with traces of alkaline, chlorides, and sulphates. The ash of the husk differs, in consisting chiefly of common salt, phosphate of lime and magnesia."
The analysis of the ash of the Peanut, furnished to the American Agriculturist, by H. B. Cornwall, Professor of Analytical Chemistry in the John C. Green School of Science, College of New Jersey, Princeton, and published in that Journal for July, 1880, gives the following as the mineral elements of this plant:
PER ONE HUNDRED PARTS OF ASH.
| Silica | 1.06 |
| Potash | 44.73 |
| Soda | 14.60 |
| Lime | 1.71 |
| Magnesia | 12.65 |
| Phosphoric acid | 17.64 |
| Sulphuric acid | 2.53 |
| Chlorine | 0.15 |
| 95.07 |