170 BOARD OF AGRICULTUEE. 



Insoluble Organic Matter. 



Containing niti'ogen, 

 Equal to ammonia, 



'total amount of nitrogen in 



the manure, 

 Equal to ammonia, 



The manure contains ammo- 

 nia in a free state, . . 0.96 0.15 0.20 0.11 



The manure contains ammo- 

 nia in the form of salts, eas- 

 ily decomposed by quick- 

 lime, 2.49 



Total amount of organic mat- 

 ter, 701.45 



Total amount of mineral mat- 

 ter, 258.65 



In addition to the cost of making barn manure where it is 

 made specially, or reckoning it at the price you can sell at or 

 buy for, is to be added the cost of carting and spreading, 

 which is no small item, and adds much to the labor of the 

 farm and team to be kept to transport it, to say nothing of 

 the liability of infesting the ground with weeds and noxious 

 herbs which it all contains to a greater or less extent. 



To understand the part which manures play in rendering soil 

 productive, recourse must be had to the analysis of the plants 

 themselves. The composition of these will necessarily indi- 

 cate the materials which must be suppUed in order to promote 

 their healthy growth. 



Where soils are submitted to the action of fire, there is an 

 organic part which burns off completely, and a residue left 

 incapable of combustion, consisting of mineral substances. 



The same result follows the action of heat on plants ; healthy 

 plants invariably contain a certain number of these mineral 

 ingredients, and in fact always the same substances, the nature 

 and quality or the varying proportions of which are ascer- 

 tained by finding the composition of the ashes of the plants. 



The organic portion dissipated by the heat consists mainly 

 of the elements, — carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen and oxygen, — 

 which produce by their union the various proximate principles 

 of which plants are composed. The development of a plant 



