Letter from R. R. Ltvingjion, to Arthur Youngs Efq, j^^ 



various breeds. If the wool fhould retain its prefent finenefs, 

 when it increafes in quantity, we fhall not need Spanifh fheep 

 to improve ours. You find by the firft part of the proceedings 

 of our Agricultural Society, which I directed the Secretary to 

 tranfmit you, that we are beginning to copy your example, 

 and to form plans for the advancement of Agriculture. The 

 fecond part, which is now in the prefs, will be tranfmitted to 

 you. Since you have thought the experiments on gypfum, 

 which I communicated to the Society, worthy a place in your 

 annals, I would jufl inform you, that I have continued to ufe 

 it with equal effed: : but what pleafes me more, is to find that 

 my theory, with refpeft to its operating not merely as a 

 ftimulus, but adtually adding, by its efFeds on the air, to the 

 fertihty of the earth, feems to be confirmed by the following 

 experiments, the communication of which is the princioal 

 objedt of this letter. 



For two fummers, feveral farmers in my neighbourhood 



have applied it to the manuring of potatoes, when they have 



not had a fufficiency of dung for the whole ground they had 



prepared for planting, and they have all aiTured me that the 



produd was greater from the parts treated with gypfum, than 



from that which they had manured with dung. It is applied 



to the potatoes, when they are about three inches high, at 



the firfl hoeing, in the proportion of about fix bufliels to the 



acre. I this year tried it on two fields of buck-wheat, upon 



T 



