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It should be noted, too, that certain crops which are exceedingly important for economic systems of permanent agriculture require very large amounts of calcium as plant food. Thus a four-ton crop of clover hay takes about 120 pounds of calcium from the soil, or the same amount as of potassium; while such a crop of alfalfa requires about 145 pounds of calcium, but only 96 pounds of potassium.

I wrote down to my partner by that night's post informing him of the happy circumstance. The order was for two grand steam hammer pile-drivers, each with four-ton hammer-blocks.The wrought-iron guide case and the steam cylinder were to weigh in all seven tons. All this weight was to rest on the shoulders of the pile. The blows were to be about eighty in the minute.

"Mason," he continued, "you have your big 'copter here; the gang of you can all get in it. I'm taking off in a four-ton truck, with some of these kids. I want you boys to follow us. We're going to Pelton's store. There's a fight going on there, and the captain's in the middle of it. We gotta get him out." They all looked at him in puzzled surprise, but nobody gave him any argument.

These ponderous parts rest on the shoulders of the pile H all the while it is being driven, the pile in this respect being the only support of the apparatus A B C. So that, besides the eighty blows per minute that the four-ton steam hammer energetically deals out to the head of the pile from a four foot fall the dead weight of the apparatus constantly acts as a most effective "predisposer" to the sinking of the pile into the ground; the hoisting chain D being let slack the while, so as to allow A B C to "follow down" the pile H, while the eighty blows per minute are incessantly showered on its head.

The whole weight of the cylinder, hammer-block, and guide box, supported by the shoulders of the pile, amounting to seven tons in all, rested upon the shoulders of the pile as a "persuader;" and the eighty blows per minute of the four-ton hammer came down with tremendous energy upon the top of the pile head. No soil, that piles could penetrate, could resist such effective agencies.

It is not very hard to remember that a four-ton crop of clover hay, which we ought to harvest from one acre in two cuttings, contains: 160 pounds of nitrogen, 31 pounds of magnesium, 20 pounds of phosphorus, 120 pounds of potassium, 117 pounds of calcium.

He'd expected some argument with her, but she seemed to accept Ray Pelton's printing as Prestonby's; she began checking room charts and class lists, and calling for the boys to be sent at once to the office. He went out, and down to the 'copter repair shop, where he found that a big four-ton air truck that the senior class had been working on for several weeks was finished.

Stevens, appearing suddenly in the doorway, and then he paused, much more confused even than the young people, for Sam was holding both Miss Josephine's hands and gazing down at her with an earnestness which, if harnessed, would have driven a four-ton dynamo; and she was gazing up at him just as earnestly, with an entirely breathless, but by no means displeased expression.

Often in stress for the necessaries of life, there are yet no men as a class more free-handed and generous; trained to do everything for themselves, there are none more willing to help others. It is no small task to pull a four-ton boat out of the water with only such wilderness tackle as we could devise.

At a given signal we started together. I let in the steam, and the hammer at once began to work. The four-ton block showered down blows at the rate of eighty a minute; and in the course of four and a half minutes my pile was driven down to the required depth. The men working at the ordinary machine had only begun to drive. It took them upwards of twelve hours to complete the driving of their pile!