356 ARTIFICIAL MANURES. 



knows, in purchasing a ton of superphosphate, poudrette, 

 guano, &c., whether he is or is not paying for half a ton of 

 coal-ashes or other worthless dirt. The consequence of this 

 has been that many farmers have bought a little superphos- 

 phate as an experiment, have found no beneficial result from 

 its use, and so have given it up as a bad job and pronounced 

 the whole system of artificial manuring a swindle. The 

 example of each man has had its effect on his neighbors, and 

 there is, consequently, a wide-spread belief that all artificial 

 manures are humbugs. 



At the same time, there are so many who do fully under- 

 stand the value of these fertilizers, and whose land absolutely 

 needs their aid, that the manufacture and sale of such as 

 are of established good quality has reached enormous pro- 

 portions. 



On farms where large stocks of cattle are fed, and for lands 

 which are enriched by the raising of clover as a green crop, 

 the necessity for the use of foreign manures is much less 

 than where the crops are mainly sold off, and no recupera- 

 tive process (such as the use of green crops) is adopted. 



There is, in all fertile lands, a large reserve stock of min- 

 eral plant-food which is not yet in a proper condition to be 

 taken up by roots, and if the cropping is not too severe 

 the produce being mainly consumed at home, and the ma- 

 nure economically used, or the frequent use of green crop 

 manuring being resorted to the gradual development, in 

 an available form, of these mineral matters will maintain 



