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24 i 
30 ns MANURES. * 
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liquid manure from a dung-hill, should be laid on the surface of the 
soil, and not dug in: the manure being covered, if hot dry weather 
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be expected, with leaves, straw, or the branches of trees cut off in 
- pruning, or occasionally sprinkled with water. Soils consisting of 
poor, and partly loose sand, are frequently improved in the South of 
"France and Italy, by sowing them with the seeds of the common 
white lupine, and then, when the plants have come up and are 
grown about a foot high, ploughing or digging them into the soil. 
The green succulent stems of the lupines, when thus buried in the soil, 
supply it with moisture during the progress of their decay ; and thus 
nourishment is afforded to the corn, which is immediately afterwards 
sown upon the soil for a‘crop. Clayey soils should have unferment- 
ed manure mixed with undecayed straw laid in the bottom of the 
furrows made in digging; that the process of fermentation, and the 
remains of the straw may operate in keeping the particles of the soil 
open, or, in other words, in preventing their too close adhesion. 
Lime as a manure can very seldom be employed advantageously in. 
gardens and pleasure grounds; only indeed where there is a super- 
abundance of humic acid, as described in page 26. When ap- 
plied to grass, as it frequently is, it has been found by repeated 
_ experiments to sink down through the soil, without mixing with it, 
and to form a distinct stratum an inch or two below the surface of 
the soil. This may be seen in several places where the ground has 
been cut through for railroads ; particularly in the Midland counties 
railroad, near Leicester, where the lime which has been applied to 
the grass land, forms a narrow white line, very conspicuous from the 
red sandstone of the district. Lime should, therefore, be always well 
mixed with the soil when used as a manures and when burnt, it 
should be used alone, as it will destroy and waste all the animal 
manure applied with it. As carbonate of lime, or chalk, however, 
(in which state only it can properly be called a soil,) animal manure 
may be applied to it with great advantage, and it will retain its effi- 
cacy longer than with any other soil. Rotten manure may be dug 
into chalk, with the certainty that it will be preserved from further 
decay for a very long time, and that every shower will work a small 
portion of its fertilizing juices out of it, and carry them into the soil, 
where they will be thus presented to the plants in the best possible 
state for affording wholesome food. 
Peat bogs may be improved by the addition of quick-lime as a 
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