MANUMISSION. 



MANURE. 



106 



worthy men in a manner contrary to truth is the most sinful wretch in 

 the world; he is the worst of thieves, a stealer of minds (4, 255). 

 Kven here below an unjust man attains no felicity, nor he whose 

 wealth proceeds from giving false evidence ; for the soul itself is its 

 own witness : offend not thy soul, the supreme internal witness of 

 men. The sinful have said in their hearts ' No one sees us.' Yes, the 

 gods distinctly see them, and so does the spirit within their breasts 

 (4, 170 ; 8, 84). He who perseveres in good actions, in subduing his 

 passions, in bestowing gifts, in gentleness of manners, who bears hard- 

 ships patiently, who associates not with the malignant, who gives pain 

 to no sentient being, obtains final beatitude (4, 246 ; 12, 10). Single 

 in each man born, single he dies, single he receives the reward of his 

 good, and single the punishment of his evil deeds. When he leaves 

 his corpse, like a log or lump of clay on the ground, his kindred retire 

 with averted faces, but his virtue accompanies his soul " (4, 240). The 

 principal moral duties in general are summed up in the following 

 passage : " The avoiding of all injury to animated beings, veracity, the 

 abstaining from theft and from unjust seizure of property, cleanliness 

 and command over the bodily organs, form the compendious system of 

 duty which M.uiu has ordained for the four classes " (10, 63). To 

 conclude with the words of Sir William Jones : " The work contains 

 abundance of curious matter, extremely interesting both to specu- 

 lative lawyers and to antiquaries, with many beauties which need 

 not be pointed out, and with many blemishes which cannot be 

 justified or palliated ; it is a system of despotism and priestcraft, 

 both indeed limited by law, but artfully conspiring to give mutual 

 support." 



The time at which the laws of Manu wer3 composed is wholly un- 

 certain, and it was only from conjecture that the eminent Sanscrit 

 scholar whom we have just named fixed the 12th century B.C. as the 

 probable epoch of their composition. Generally speaking we may 

 safely pronounce it the code of an already refined and enlightened 

 people, and the work itself bears ample testimony that a very advancing 

 degree of civilisation had been acquired by the Hindus when these 

 laws were promulgated. But what is most important, is that the 

 burning of widows is totally unknown : on the contrary, a widow is 

 legally bound to devote herself to pious austerity, and may even be 

 lawfully married to the brother of her deceased husband, as she 

 could marry any other man during the reign of king Vena (3, 173 ; 

 5, 1;>7). Now the duties of a .Satti, so minutely detailed in works of 

 later date, could not possibly be omitted in a sacred code of law, and 

 therefore the work seems at least anterior to the invasion of India 

 by the Macedonians, who were fully acquainted with these horrid 

 sacrifices. 



The learned Hindus agree that many laws enacted by Manu were 

 confined to the first three ages of the world, and have no force in the 

 present age ; some of them have been abolished or modified by subse- 

 quent Himlu lawgivers, according to whom the work is rather to be 

 honoured than to be strictly followed. In fact for a long time it has 

 formed only a very small part of the juridical system, and may be con- 

 sidered as the oldest text-book of law extant, or as the Hindu ' Insti- 

 tutes,' preparatory to the copious ' Digests,' ' Pandects,' and other legal 

 works now in use among the different juridical schools in India. 

 (Ellis, in ' Madras Transactions,' vol. i., and Sir Thomas Strange, 

 ' Hindu Law, principally with reference to such portions of it as con- 

 cern the Administration of Justice in the King's Courts in India," 

 Lond., 1830.) 



The ' Institutes ' of Hindu law, or the ' Ordinances of Manu,' were 

 verbally translated from the original by Sir William Jones, 1794. The 

 Sanscrit text with the gloss of Kullukabhatta was published at Cal- 

 cutta in 1813, and a new edition of the metrical text, together with 

 Sir William Jones's translation, carefully collated with the original, 

 was prepared by Sir Graves Haughton, 1822, 1825. Another valuable 

 edition was published in Sanscrit, with select notes and various readings, 

 at Paris, in 1830, and a French translation with notes and explanations, 

 both by Loiseleur des Longchamps, at Paris in 1833. 



HAN0MI8SION. [LIBKRTINUS ; SLAVE.] 



\URE. Kvery substance which has been used to improve the 

 natural soil, or to restore to it the fertility which is diminished by the 

 crops annually carried away, has been included in the name of manure. 

 Thus chalk, marl, clay, and even sand, when added to the soil for the 

 M: of improving its texture, have been called manures ; and some 

 confusion has arisen in our ideas in consequence of applying the same 

 word to signify things which are essentially different. The French 

 havp a term by which they distinguish the substances which merely 

 improve the mechanical texture of the soil from those which act more 

 ly in nourishing the plants which grow in it. The former of 

 these they call ametuUmentu, and the latter cn>/rai. 



It is well known to all practical agriculturists that the texture of the 

 soil and the proportions of the earths of which it is composed are the 

 ml most important conditions of its productive powers. When 

 there is a good natural loam which retains moisture without becoming 

 wet or overcharged with it, and permits the influence of the atmos- 

 pheric air to pervade it, the crops cannot fail to be more certain and 

 j<; than in 1"< r tenacious clays, however rich they 



may !> in thos.: nutiHtniiees which are supposed to supply the element.! 

 the juices of plants are chit-fly composed. But, at the 

 amc time, it is equally true that the best textuic of soil will not pro- 



ABTS AND SCI. DIV. VOL. V. 



duce good crops for any length of time without the help of some 

 other rich manure to recruit the loss produced by vegetation. 



The various means of improving the texture, such ;is tillage and the 

 mixture of earths, are treated of separately. [LOAM ; MAUL ; SOIL ; 

 TILLAGE.] AVe shall here confine our observations to that class of 

 manures which stimulate or enrich the soil. 



There are some substances which evidently belong to both classes of 

 manure. Of these, lime, either in its caustic state of quick-lime or its 

 milder form of a carbonate or chalk, is the principal. Lime, being an 

 earth less porous than sand, and more so than clay, has an improving 

 effect on soils in which either sand or clay prevails ; but it has also 

 a chemical effect as an alkaline earth ; and, considered in this light, it 

 acts on the soil in a peculiar manner, and greatly assists the effect of 

 enriching manures, which are all of animal or vegetable origin. 



Lime as a manure acts most powerfully in its caustic state that is, 

 when deprived of the carbonic acid which is generally united with it. 

 The carbonic acid is expelled by the heat of the kiln, and limestone is 

 by this means reduced to the state of quick-lime, in which it has so 

 strong an attraction for moisture and carbonic acid, that, if it be 

 left exposed to the atmosphere for any length of time, it absorbs both 

 from it, and gradually returns to the state of hydrate and carbonate, or 

 lime united with water and carbonic acid, with this difference, that it 

 is now a fine impalpable powder, instead of a hard stone. 



Among the purposes it serves, and besides its use as a direct food of 

 plants, are those comprised in its relations to the dormant and mis- 

 chievous ingredients of soils ; its power to detach serviceable alkaline 

 matters from useless positions in the soil ; its power to induce the 

 decomposition of vegetable matter there ; its power to decompose and 

 render harmless mineral and metallic salts of a mischievous character ; 

 its uses in detaching ammonia from comparatively insoluble compounds 

 of it, and so presenting portions ready for immediate use by the plant ; 

 its influence in possibly increasing the power of soils to absorb ammonia 

 from the air. 



Besides all this, its influence on the texture of the soil, on the growth 

 of weeds, on the general fertility of the land, on the growth especially 

 of particular crops, on the health and soundness more especially of the 

 turnip crop, should be also named. 



The use of frequent limings in small doses, as compared with 

 larger dressings at longer intervals, depends on the quantity of 

 vegetable matter in the soil, but the larger dressings are generally 

 to be preferred, on the grounds that in practice the full influence 

 of a liming is not seen until after several years, and that the abundant 

 fertility which, when lime is properly used, is consequent upon its 

 use, may, when rightly managed, be made to reproduce itself, and so 

 become permanent. The abuses to which it is liable are, chiefly, 

 its application to soils deficient in vegetable matter, and its application 

 along with manure rich in ammoniaeal matters. But a distinction 

 may be drawn between rotten dung and recent farm manure in this 

 respect, the application of hot lime along with the former being waste- 

 ful, but along with the latter by no means uneconomical. There are 

 many modes of applying lime, as slaked or unslaked, in compost with 

 vegetable matter of any kind, or directly to the land, ploughed in 

 deep or shallow, in quantities of 40 or of 240 bushels per acre, pre- 

 viously to a corn crop or a green crop, on a corn or clover stubble, 

 &c. One of the best rules of practice is, to apply it where there is the 

 greatest quantity of undecomposed vegetable fibre in the soil ; and, acting 

 on this rule, the best time in the rotation for the application of lime 

 is on the clover stubble or the grass Layer previous to ploughing it up 

 for a grain crop. 



The use of quick-lime in rendering iuert vegetable fibres soluble, and 

 hastening the decomposition of animal substances, is of the greatest 

 importance in agriculture. Substances may be rendered highly enrich- 

 ing in a short time, which, without it, would have lain long dormant 

 in the soil or the dung-heap. Its effects in this way will be more 

 particularly noticed when we treat of composts. 



Wherever there is peaty matter in the soil which, owing to the 

 tannin principle which it contains, is, by itself, perfectly incapable of 

 putrefaction lime is the true remedy. On the other hand, in a very 

 stiff clay, chalk or lime will render it much more porous, and admit 

 the influence of the atmosphere ; it will correct acidity, and assist the 

 nutritious effects of animal and vegetable manures. Quick-lime spread 

 on a soil abounding in vegetable matter will make it active by dissolving 

 the half-decomposed fibres and converting them into a soluble mucilage : 

 being extremely minutely divided by its property of attracting moisture 

 rapidly, a very small quantity produces an immediate effect. Hence it 

 is generally spread over fallows or clover-leys, which are preparing for 

 wheat-sowing. If it were put on the land long before the seed is sown, 

 it would have lost its chief and immediate power by attracting carbonic 

 acid and returning to the state of carbonate or chalk, and all the expense 

 of burning would be thrown away, except as far as it has thoroughly 

 pulverised it. But frost does this with chalk spread before winter 

 at a much cheaper rate ; and a good dressing with chalk will last in 

 the soil, and its effects be preserved, many years after all the lime 

 would have disappeared. It is therefore a matter of mere experiment 

 and calculation whether it be more profitable to put ten wag s 'on-loads 

 of chalk on an acre of (stiff clay, or one or two waggon loads of quick- 

 lime. If the foil bo very tenacious, the chalk will probably bo the 

 most profitable in the end iw '.veil as the cheapest; but for a few crops 



H U 



