Examples from literature

• Borax is a mild alkaline body, and as a detergent is probably equivalent to a slight excess of caustic soda. 
• It occurs in body wastes, in artificial fertilizers, as a by-product of natural decay, and very notably in detergents. 
• Nitrogen and phosphorus occur in the effluent from waste treatment plants, for they are present in human wastes and in detergents, and in dissolved form are little affected by standard treatment processes. 
• This scarcity of oleaginous matter produced a corresponding scarcity of soap and similar detergents, but this was a deprivation which caused the Rebels, as a whole, as little inconvenience as any that they suffered from.