260 



THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



is only when tbe dose of manure is too strong that water- 

 plants, like land-plants, are destroyed, I remember the time 

 when salmon were caught in the Thames and the Lea, smelts 

 at Blackwall, and roach at Blackfriars ; but we have over- 

 done the dose, destroyed the purifying weeds, and driven 

 away the fish, at all events nearly as far up as Richmond. 

 Beyond that, although the river has received the manure of 

 many towns and cities, the water is transparent, and fish 

 abundant. When I passed Twickenham last summer, leaning 

 over the bows of the " Maria Wood," I could see through 

 the pellucid water the lively fish, the waving weeds on which 

 they feed, aud clear pebbly bottom of the river. We need 

 not, therefore, alarm ourselves about the dissgreeable results 

 of applying the sewage of our towns to an extensive agri- 

 cultural area. Science has taught us that water and marine 

 plants get their food from the aqueous medium in which they 

 grow. Whole generations of marine animals and fish, with 

 their excreta, become, in solution, food for those plants from 

 which their own nutrition was directly or indirectly origi- 

 nally derived. The great sea-weeds, aa long as St. Paul's 

 is high (see Darwin), take their food from the surrounding 

 elements, organic and inorganic, held in solution by the sea- 

 water. Probably our marine vegetables and animals equal 

 in bulk and quantity those of our terrestrial surface. In the 

 vast ocean, the hand of man is not required to manure or 

 cultivate. The vegetation in the ditches through which the 

 sewage flowed would grow luxuriantly, provided it were not 

 too concentrated. 



The rain-fall or storm-water of Londo7i must at 

 times be very valuable, especially those hasty storms 

 after dry weather. Taking the area of the metropolis 

 at 144 square miles, 92,160 acres, the annual rain-fall 

 at 24 inches or 2,400 tons per acre, the total would be 

 221,184,000 tons. The rain-fall would thus appear to 

 be nearly twice as great as the water supply. Mr. 

 Bazalgette, in a paper read before the Society of Civil 

 Engineers, on the 31st of January, 1857, tells us that 

 in 1855 there were — 



226 dry days in the year, 

 90 days on which the average amount of rain-fall varied 



irom the smallest fraction to the tenth of an inch per 



diem. 

 21 days on which from one-tenth to one-fifth of an inch of 



rain fell. 

 28 days on which there were heavy rain-falls. 



365 



It is thus evident how much of the sewage may be ren- 

 dered available, and particularly during the warm grow- 

 ing months, when the grasses demand an abundant sup- 

 ply of food and moisture. Of course during very heavy 

 floods some of the manure would be unavailable. Mr. 

 Bazalgette says, " Heavy storms occur at distant periods 

 only, and are of short duration ; but the bulk of the 

 waters produced by them is enormous, compared with 

 the flow of sewage in dry weather, and with the quantity 

 discharged during ordinary rains." 



Why was there always corn in, Egypt ? Because there 

 is irrigation from the overflowing of the Nile. I am 

 told it never rains in the interior of Egypt. It is a 

 singular contrast, that whilst we, as a lood-desiring 

 people, place no value on the water, much less the 



the sewage contains very little, if any, fertilizing quality ; 

 certainly none of commercial value. Indeed, a careful consi- 

 deration of the economy of our rivers might have anticipated 

 the conclusion. Look at the course of the Thames flowing 

 through this great city ; consider the enormous population on 

 its hanks, before it reaches the metropolis ; what would have 

 been its condition had not running waters possessed that 

 quality of self-purification [What does Father Thames say to 

 thisdurmg the hot months?], which renders the sewage of 

 towns of no practical value. 1 trust, then, that this sersion 

 will not close without our having well considered the conditions 

 under which a well-regulated cesspool system can be properly 

 apphed.and under what circumstances towns can be advanta- 

 geously drained by out-fall sewers." 



excrements, of our great cities, the Egyptians are im- 

 porting British coal at 40s. per ton, and costly steam 

 and pumping machinery of British manufacture, for 

 the purpose of raising water to irrigate those lands 

 over which the Nile does not flow, and thus produce 

 plenty of corn for the British market. Although we 

 have not the amount of sunshine to force two cereal 

 crops annually, we can always vie with Eastern coun- 

 tries in meat-making grasses and succulent roots. The 

 water of the Nile contains no sewage, but it brings 

 down from the snow-clad tops of the distant moun- 

 tains the inorganic debris of the soil, crumbled and 

 disintegrated by atmospheric vicissitudes. What a 

 clear and simple proof is this of the great Liebig's 

 mineral theory I for where those frosts and snows pre- 

 vail neither animals nor vegetain c an exist. Mr. 

 William Bullock Webster, who has been travelling in 

 the East, in connection with extensive agricultural 

 objects, has kindly furnished me with much interesting 

 informatiofi on Egyptian agriculture. 



Inexhaustibility of Land. — The tendency of the hu- 

 man mind to believe in the inexhaustibility of the soil 

 is curiously illustrated by the settlers in the United 

 States. The litter and manure from their animals they 

 get rid of as a nuisance, by throwing it into the nearest 

 river, or any other inexpensive way. A neighbour of 

 mine, whose brother is farming in the United States, 

 told me that he had bought a farm on which there was 

 the accumula ed manure of eighteen years ! The pro- 

 prietor had never considered it of any value, because he 

 grew good crops without it. It is this sentiment that 

 has exhausted and ruined much land in the early settle- 

 ments. The well got dry at last. Let us take warning 

 by this, and not waste either our farm or town sewage. 



B^ect of Sewaqe Manure on Woods and Timber.-— 

 My own practical experience is, that shrubs and trees 

 increase much more rapidly in growth by sewage than 

 by any other means, and I am quite sure it would pay 

 those who are desirous to grow timber to lay down lines 

 of iron pipes, and effect irrigation with sewage manure. 

 There is no practical difficulty in the matter. Sporting 

 men who love close cover would have it to their heart's 

 content, and the vegetation would be rich in quality and 

 quantity, and so acceptable to game of all kinds, that 

 the adjoining farmers would have much less reason to 

 complain about damage from game than they have at 

 present. 



Our noble Parks would be greatly benefited by Sewage. 

 As a general rule (except on particular soils) our parks 

 are poor, mossy, and unsatisfying to deer and other ani- 

 mals; sewage would alter all this, bringing sweet and 

 abundant herbage, promoting and prolonging the growth 

 of our noble timber trees. If you doubt it, examine Lord 

 Essex's park at Watford, where the mere application of 

 sewage has destroyed the drab and coarse ferns, and sub- 

 stituted for them rich, green, soft herbage. The line of 

 demarcation where the sewage has not reached is strik- 

 ingly illustrative of its great merits. I assume that 

 every gardener knows the value of sewage manure and 

 burned clay. 



Effects of Sewage on Wastes and Commons. — There 

 are many extensive filtrative wastes and commons lying 

 within reach of our large towns and cities which would, 

 by the mere application of sewage, become covered with 

 a rich and spontaneous vegetation acceptable and fatten- 

 ing to animals. Non-filtrative wastes would require 

 drainage. 



To what Crops can Sewage be most profitably 

 applied. — Cereal crops can rarely be forced beyond a 

 well-known full average— say, wheat 6 qrs., barley 8 to 

 9 qrs., beans 8 qrs., oats 11 to 13 qrs. per acre ; and 

 even to obtain these crops on very richly manured land 

 a very small quantity of seed must be sown, or the crop 



