6 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



The first was that of the committee, consisting of Messrs. 

 Fisher, Brooks and White, who presented the following 



REPORT 



ON THE APPLICATION OF MANURES. 



The undersigned were appointed by the Board at a meeting 

 during the early part of the year 1859, as a committee for the 

 purpose of considering and reporting upon the subject of the 

 best depth of applying manures ; that being one of eleven 

 different subjects selected by the Board as appropriate for inves- 

 tigation. In pursuance of our instructions received at the 

 time, we prepared a circular, with the expectation that the 

 experiment therein contained, for the performance of which 

 specific and detailed directions are given, might be tried by as 

 many of the cultivators in the State as possible. We hoped 

 that the combined result which might be arrived at in this way 

 would be extremely valuable, as it would be really the first step 

 taken in this particular direction towards obtaining reliable 

 facts, through which we might ultimately be enabled to discover 

 a principle ; in other words, having discovered in part what 

 nature is, we might be enabled to look through her up to her 

 governing laws. 



In the preparation of this circular we were guided by the 

 following considerations : The real knowledge upon the subject 

 in possession of the community is absolutely nothing. Even 

 the most intelligent and observing men concerned in agricul- 

 tural pursuits, when inquired of upon it, can give no opinion 

 of any value, because such an opinion as they may cherish has 

 not been attained through any actual experiment or knowledge, 

 but is founded upon hearsay, or reasoning from analogy ; the 

 analogy itself being often uncertain or obscure. For two or 

 three years past agricultural papers have been discussing the 

 matter with a good degree of zeal, but without arriving at any 

 thing in the way of a result, for the reason that although theories 

 may be plausible enough, yet in the absence of facts to sustain 

 them, they arc worth comparatively nothing. Public opinion 

 has drifted about with the wind and tide, and this theory or 

 that has been alternately at the surface or in the subsoil, accord- 



