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THE FARMER'^ MAGAZINE. 



PREMIUMS FOR THE BEST MANURES. 



THE IIILLVLSTOWE TURNIP EXPERIMENT. 



There is still one branch of tlie business of the farm 

 which has long been conducted in a very unsatisfactory 

 manner. This is the further remarkable as it is a fea- 

 ture that of late years has been more and more de- 

 veloping itself. The progress of modern agriculture is 

 as directly identified with the use of artificial manures, 

 as with the employment of improved machinery or the 

 extension of good stock. The trade has been gradually 

 increasing, but at the same time by no means assuming 

 that general tone of respectability and confidence it 

 ought properly to possess. In fact, to this day the 

 farmer, in commercial phrase, is a " shy " buyer. 

 The greater the competition, only the greater would 

 appear to be the roguery. If \he manufacturer means 

 right, it is not always that he can answer for his agent ; 

 while there are some notable instances where the im- 

 position has been altogether wholesale. With some 

 honourable exceptions, the dealing in manures is still a 

 lottery, with the player or purchaser, as in the majority 

 of such games of chance, of course the sufferer. 



Many schemes have been devised for meeting such an 

 evil. In the first place, you should adopt the gieat rule 

 of all commercial transactions, and only deal with re- 

 spectable people. Then you must not regard the mere 

 cheapness, or rather the lowness in price, of the article 

 supplied. Indeed nothing has been found to be dearer 

 than cheap manures. Further, you must be very cau- 

 tious how you credit testimonials, but read them rather 

 as you would the puffs to quack medicines. The good 

 men whose signatures you see may have been deceived, 

 as they often enough are. Their experiments may have 

 been tried with a very different sample to what the 

 World at large could obtain. Many a reference has ere 

 now denied himself. Above all, however, the buyer 

 should have an analysis of what is sent him. Let some 

 competent chemist tell him what it is really worth, and 

 if not equal to its character let it at once be returned. 

 But this is scarcely as easy a matter as it seems to be. 

 The other contracting party will in all probability 

 demur, or refuse outright to abide by any such opinion. 

 A law-suit will hardly increase the profits of the ven- 

 ture, and so the farmer is placed on the horns of a 

 dilemma — wanting and willing to buy good manure, 

 but not knowing where to get it. Men of fair fame 

 certainly allow their names to head the prospectus of 

 many such a Company. Others offer their word for the 

 good they have really derived from the use of certain 

 sorts, and Professor Way, or Professor Voelcker, or 

 Professor Nesbit, or Professor Anderson, are always 

 available. Still, we repeat, the business is not alto- 

 gether satisfactory, and we certainly require some other 

 means to put it on a better footing. 



The farmers of Lincolnshire, in their need, have gone 

 back to a precedent. They know full well already 



that any man in the line has always the best kind of 

 implement or the best breed of cattle. It is naturally 

 the same with the manufacture of manures. There is 

 not an agent comes into the market but who represents 

 the most respectable house, and has the moat valuable 

 sample to show them. But we want something more 

 in these days, than a man's mere ipse dixit of his own 

 worth and character; while wo don't want to be drawn 

 into lawsuits, or to have our Ways and Voelckers 

 publicly out-sworn. Tell it not in the West Coun- 

 tree, carry it not to the remote region of Barnstaple, 

 and excite not with such a rumour the busy hives of 

 the Ipswich, the Bedford, or the Leiston Works ! But 

 the farmers of Lincolnshire, instead of abolishing have 

 extended the action of the prize system. They intend 

 to have not only prize Shorthorns and prize Steam 

 Engines, but prize Manures. It must be un- 

 derstood, too, there was no leading up to this, 

 but that it has been a purely spontaneous movement 

 amongst the farmers themselves, conceived and carried 

 out by no greater machinery than the Brigg Market 

 Ordinary. It has been well done, too. If, indeed, 

 agriculturists will only properly organize similar tests 

 of this kind, the chicanery of manure-making will soon 

 become an unprofitable profession. Let them all learn 

 how a consummation so devoutly to be wished is to bo 

 attained. When, then, Mr. Richardson, with his bro- 

 ther farmers to aid liim, resolved on offering prizes for 

 manures, he did not send round to the different manu- 

 facturers or to local agents for specimens ; but he took 

 the !iamj)le to he tried from the hulk some consumer 

 had still in store. Here was a test, assuredly, in its 

 very purity. There could be no questioning as to this 

 being the sort of stuff you are prepared to sell at so 

 much a ton? It actually had been ; and the greater, 

 accordingly, the triumph of those who now rank 

 as the makers or vendors of the prize manures. We 

 direct the most careful attention of our readers to the 

 following report; for we really know of few move- 

 ments of late that have promised to so directly 

 benefit the practical farmer. The perseverance in 

 and more general adoption of such a course will 

 leave him no longer at the mercy of the Trade. Every 

 dealer now will work with the knowledge that his wares 

 may be thoroughly and publicly tested, and that the 

 better they are the proportionately better will it bo for 

 his business. It is creditable to many firms having 

 connections in Lincolnshire to see how readily they 

 answered to the challenge. It is only by their con- 

 tinued willingness to do so that we shall be able to 

 draw a line between the fair and unfair dealer. It 

 is not every one that can hope to get a jirize ; but 

 by such a means wo shall soon know those that are 

 really doing justice to their customers— the approxi- 



