MANURES. 51 



tion of all who are devoted to modern agriculture. In former 

 days every form of putrescence, all stercoraceous matter, all 

 decomposed vegetable matter, earthy compounds found in 

 natural deposits, were used as manure, and were the means of 

 conducting all experiments, and the subjects of every essay on 

 the principles and processes of fertilization. The distinguished 

 founder of this society, in all his careful investigations, never 

 advanced beyond a consideration of " that precious liquor," as 

 he called it, which flows through the drainage of our stables, or 

 is absorbed by the materials which make up our heaps of com- 

 posted manure. Since his day we have advanced into the 

 regions of science, and not content with the farmyard, we have 

 called upon chemistry to furnish us with those substances, 

 which, from their portable form, and their specific properties, 

 promise to make fertilization an easy process, and a well-defined 

 and positive art. 



The introduction of guano into the list of fertilizers has 

 undoubtedly done much to excite the endeavors of those who 

 would imitate this highly stimulating manure ; and the inge- 

 nuity of man has been exhausted in endeavoring to supply the 

 farmer with homeopathic remedies for the diseases and weak- 

 nesses of his soil. Phosphates, chlorides, ammonia, nitrogen, all 

 salts and all gases, have been produced in every form, simple 

 and compound, to tempt the farmer away from his manure 

 heap, or to supply the place of such a heap, when its production 

 was an impossibility. That much benefit has been derived 

 from this there can be no doubt. The worn-out lands of some 

 portions of our own country, and the highly cultivated lands of 

 Great Britain, have undoubtedly derived great advantages from 

 guano, bones, the phosphates, and other condensed forms of 

 manures. The precise nature of the benefit of each one of these 

 substances should be carefully investigated by the best experi- 

 ments. The farmer should be enabled, in some way, to know 

 precisely what he may expect from an investment in the expen- 

 sive fertilizers so freely offered him — whether it will be of 

 temporary or permanent value, and whether of any value at all. 



While your Committee present the recorded experience of 

 some of the best farmers in the county, in the use of some of 

 the condensed fertilizers of the day, they would urge the contin- 

 uation of these trials upon the remainder of the list. Facts 



