276 SUBURBAN GARDENING. 
should be used. The plan is this:—Mark off the plot into two feet 
widths. Dig out the first of these one spade’s depth, and wheel the soil 
to the other end. Loosen the bottom of trench No. 1 as deep as possible 
with a fork, and mix with the soil a sufficient quantity of manure and 
vegetable refuse, and throw on this the surface soil from the next two 
feet space, mixing manure as may be needed. Leave the surface in a 
ridge and as rough as possible. Treat No. 2 in the same way, and each 
of the other two feet widths in succession. 
Ground prepared in either of these ways in the antumn will be in 
admirable condition for seed sowing next spring. If the ground is too 
sandy or too clayey, the occasion of the annual trenching may be taken 
advantage of to make such additions to it as may alter its texture. In 
the former case marl should be added; in the latter lime or sandy 
soil, though, if manure be applied at the autumn digging, the application 
of lime had better, in most cases, be deferred till spring, some little 
time before seed sowing. Whenever land is dressed with lime, particu- 
larly for the purpose of altering its texture, it should be dug in at once, 
so that the atmosphere may not rob it of its energy. 
MANURES. 
Every crop, especially every heavy crop, withdraws from the ground 
fertilising elements. However rich soil is naturally, its stores are yearly 
diminished if it is persistently cropped, and if materials replacing what 
has been withdrawn are withheld. The constant replacement of what is 
withdrawn, in some form or other, is therefore necessary to maintain the 
crop-producing powers of a garden. If a nice adjustment of supplies to 
withdrawals be always maintained, the normal capacity of production 
will, of course, be preserved. It must be obvious to all who think about 
the subject that the ordinary methods of manuring are more or less 
haphazard, but experience has proved that manure consisting of the 
products of the stable, cow-house, and piggery, in sufficient 
quantity, is all-sufficing for most garden crops. In our gar-— 
dens we grow peas, beans, cabbages, and other vegetables, and 
each takes away from the land something. The skilful cultivator 
tries to ascertain what this something is, and to replace it at the 
first opportunity. If the crops grown in a given {space were allowed 
to decay there the soil would receive back all that had been taken from it 
with something added; but our garden crops are more profitably con- 
sumed as food, and the withdrawn substances replaced in another form 
at once convenient and effectual. 
The Rev. Henry Moule, vicar’ of Fordington, impressed by a sense 
of the importance of maintaining the fertility of land at the least possible 
cost, as well as by other considerations, has for years advocated the 
return of human excreta, mixed with dry earth, as the most effectual and 
least expensive method, at the same time {that it afforded a solution of 
one of the most pressing problems of the time. Where his plan can be 
properly carried out, no one, we think, can ‘question its value. In the 
country it can often be carried out easily and economically; but at 
present, for want of perfect self-acting, apparatus, and the difficulty of 
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