Pa 
On Plaister of Paris. 15 
tinued on the ground in the smallest degree. I have 
heard of some instances to the contrary, but none have 
fallen under my observation. 
Query. 5. Have you repeated the application of it 
with or without ploughing 2?—at what intervals, and 
with what effects ? ‘ 
Query. 6. do you find that it renders the earth ste- 
rile after its useful effects are gone ? 
Answer. 1 have beneficially repeated the application 
with and without ploughing; but I succeed best in a 
repetition after cultivating, and dressing slightly with sta- 
ble manure, or with ploughing in green manures. I have 
ploughed in buckwheat in full blossom (which in a fort- 
night or three weeks, often in less time, becomes putrefi- 
ed and converted into excellent manure, having under- 
gone a violent fermentation) and sowed winter grain, on 
which I have sowed clover seed; and having strewed 
plaister on the clover, similar, if not greater effects, 
have been produced than were received from the first 
dressing. Ploughing in clover affords a pabulum for 
the plaister, which fails often in mellow grounds in fine 
tilth, where the putreficd substances are scarce, or have 
been exhausted by ploughing and frequent exposure. : 
In short, I find it must have something to feed on,as 
some farmers express it. In the first application, it has 
the decayed roots of vegetable substances it finds in the 
earth. I perceive no greater degree of sterility after 
plaister, than after dung. All manures are stimulants, 
and leave the earth wearied and vapid, from the exers. 
tions they have excited. Stable dung as bad. as any if 
} 
Me 
