206 Manuring Grass LcBfids. 



j'ears after boning. Some of the meadow land which bad been 

 let at 30*. per acre was readily raised to 3/., and still made more 

 money for the tenant when turned either to the feeding and 

 breeding of sheep, or the feeding of cattle. 



A large tract of moor-land, which had never been in tillage, 

 and which as a public pasture had yielded t)s. to 7*. the acre, 

 after boning produced 17s. the acre. 



The effect of the manure is now decidedly less apparent than 

 it was six years ago, and is evidence of a fact I have frequently 

 observed, viz. that manures are sooner operative and sooner 

 exhausted on lands lying at high altitudes than when used in 

 lower districts. 



In the year 1841 Mr. Williamson, a tenant farmer residing at 

 Huxley, near Tarporling, expended 374/. in bones, principally 

 boiled. Mr. Williamson's farm is 50 miles south-west of Cap- 

 tain De Hollenworth's farm, and is about 60 feet above the sea. 

 The whole of the bones were applied to grass land, at a cost of 

 21. IO5. per acre. Mr. Williamson's pasture land has a peculiarly 

 close-textured soil and subsoil, approaching nearly to the lias 

 clay, though brown-red in colour, and effervesces violently when 

 tested with spirit of salts. Previous to boning, the herbage on 

 these pastures was of the poorest kind imaginable — there being 

 few if any plants except the small carex ; in the second sum- 

 mer after boning the carex had disappeared, and the pasture 

 had become long and thick-set with white clover, cow-grass or 

 marl clover, and trefoil. The dairy stock had also been in- 

 creased from forty to fifty-two cows : the forty cows had been at 

 times almost starved ; the fifty-two cows had abundance, and more 

 than they could feed down, and sheep were purchased for the 

 excess keep. I inspected this farm in 1841 and 1843, under the 

 direction of an Agricultural Society. 



The bones used still show considerable effect on the soil, though 

 much less value on a given space was used than on Captain De 

 Hollenworth's farm. 



In the year 1838 I inspected a farm 28 miles west of Captain 

 De Hollenworth's. The altitude of this was about 80 feet above 

 the sea. Up to August In that year 250/. had been expended 

 in boiled bones (cost 4/. per ton) ; the quantity applied to the 

 acre was about 10 cwt., the soil and subsoil being much the same 

 as on Mr. Williamson's farm ; the herbage growing on it of the 

 same kind, but apparently more scanty. Several small fields 

 had not been dressed with the manure, nor had any stock been 

 in these fields during the summer up to the month named. So 

 little, however, was the herbage, that I computed that not more 

 than 20 stones of hay could be obtained from an acre. In 

 1839 I again Inspected this farm, and the pastures shov/ed con- 



