Plymouth Bone-Manure Manufactory; Messrs. Pontey, Rowe, and Co. The machinery, which is impelled by water, is very powerful, and the quantity of bone-dust produced in an hour is so great, that we cannot venture to put it down. The greater part of the bones are imported, and among them are human bones. Before the bones are put in the machine, they are each separately examined by women; for, the price being high, the foreigners find it worth their while to adulterate them, by inserting nails and other pieces of old iron in the hollows and crevices, and when bones having these scraps of iron in them get into the mill, the injury they do to the cylinders is very great indeed. There is a heap of old iron weighing several tons, the whole of which has been extracted from the bones by the women. When in Bavaria in 1828, we saw immense quantities of human bones in the charnel houses, the sculls having the names which they bore when alive written on their fronts, and being arranged on shelves, and the other bones lying in heaps on the floor. We do not suppose these sculls have been removed; but it is most probable that the other bones are now manuring the turnip fields of England.
