38 Dr Davy on the Mismanagement of Stable-Dung Manure. 
scarcely admitting of inquiry here; and it only remains to 
observe, that with all their faults, he looks back with many 
pleasing recollections to opportunities he enjoyed in Sindh, 
for seeing much of a wild but interesting people. 
On the Mismanagement of Stable-Dung Manure, especially as 
regards Exposure to Rain. By Joun Davy, M.D., F-.RS. 
Lond. and Edin. Communicated by the Author. 
Whilst, at a vast expense, the farmer is importing bones 
from the shores of the Black Sea, nitrate of soda from South 
America, guano from the coast of Peru and from the African 
coast, he is, in too many instances, negligent of the manure 
that his stable and stalls supply. 
This negligence has been pointed out, and emphatically 
dwelt on, by every recent writer of authority on agriculture. 
As regards exposure to rain, and the injurious effects of it 
on the kind of manure just alluded to, examples of it, in this 
part of England (Westmoreland), where an unusual quantity 
of rain falls, are of every-day occurrence, and almost every- 
where to be met with: the instances of neglect constitute 
the rule; of care and attention, the rare exception to the 
rule. The farm-steadings here are commonly on declivities ; 
the dung-heap is usually placed on a declivity, often by the 
side of a road, and, in consequence, after every shower of 
rain, the water that runs off, percolating through the ma- 
nure, robs it of some of its most valuable ingredients, espe- 
cially its soluble salts, and soluble animal and vegetable 
matter, tending to starve the fields and pollute the roads. I 
have had the curiosity to collect portions of such drainage, 
and subject them to examination ; and I now propose to give 
the results, as they shew, in a very marked manner, the in- 
jurious effect, and how great is the loss to the farmer in con- 
sequence. 
The first portion collected was from a heap of stable-dung, 
fresh from the stable just before a heavy fall of rain, the ac- 
companiment of a thunder-storm, nearly an inch falling in 
three hours. The water which ran from the dung-heap was 
