105 



produces are more apparent during the first year. Alter 

 that, these disappear, leaving the soil in its former im- 

 poverished condition ; requiring, to make adequate returns, a 

 repetition of the application every succeeding year. Recent 

 manure, on the contrary, is not limited in its benefits ; the 

 result of its application continuing to be discernible for a 

 number of years. Nature herself, indeed, teaches us the 

 advantages of this latter practice. When fermentation 

 or putrefaction goes on above ground, gaseous effluvia, 

 equally noxious as offensive, force us to bury them beneath 

 the surface — there these very operations become salutary — 

 the decomposing mass, by gradual changes, " is converted 

 into forms of beauty and usefulness ; the foetid gas is rendered 

 a constituent of the aroma of the flower, and what otherwise 

 would have proved injurious to life, becomes nourishment to 

 animals and to man." In a climate like this, the necessity of 

 employing manure in an early stage is particularly urgent, 

 the heat hurrying on the process of decomposition and soon 

 dissipating the gaseous matters, whilst the heavy rains 

 wash away all that is soluble, or might be of benefit to 

 the soil. 



There is a method practised in this country, by which all 

 the benefits of the application of manure in a recent state, 

 are obtained. The cattle are penned on the land which is 

 about to be turned up, shifting them to another place as soon 

 as we conceive our object gained. Where this system has 

 been carried to a proper extent, we find not only the fertility 

 of the soil prolonged, but, what is most rare in the agriculture 

 of this country, the land has been so much improved, as to 

 give, after years of cultivation, greater returns than it had 

 been ever known to do. 



Manure is usually applied only to the plant cane ; so that, 

 whilst the returns of the first years are from 2 to 3 or more 

 hhds., the ratoons sink down to 1 or even less; nothing 

 being done for the Canes, except keeping them, during the 

 early months of their growth, free of weeds. A more com- 

 mendable system is practised by others, wlio are in the habit 

 of applying manure to the roots ; hoeing it in so as to incor- 



