FARMERS' REGISTER— PUTRESCENT MANURES. 



671 



" untentible with the others which I have taken 

 " the liberty to examine. Even admitting tliat 

 " every corn-stalk was a firm, hollow tube li'om 

 " end to end, betbre it could act as 'a flue or chim- 

 " ney,' one end at least must be higher than the 

 " other, and the lower end not stopped up witli 

 " earth, (as it must be, if below the earlli,) but 

 " open, and sulFioiently near the ground lor the at- 

 " mosphere to ibrce into it whatever is expected to 

 " pass ujnvards through it." 



Now, if every term of comparison or phrase, is 

 to be so measured, and adjusted with mathemati- 

 cal precision to suit the ideas intcruled to be con- 

 veyed, J. M. G. might have named yet stronger 

 objections to my comparing the corn-stalk to a 

 chimney, and might have denied the correctness 

 of the comparison, because the corn-stalk does 

 not have the various |)arts essential to a chimney, 

 of "vent," '-throat," "flue," "shalt," &c., as de-^ 

 scribed by a writer in your March number. If 

 all J. M. G's. sentences and assertions were 

 tried by his own' standard of precision, many 

 would be Jbund as incomplete, and as liable to such 

 objections as mine: and if he will take care to 

 avoid liability to be visited by this kind of word- 

 catching criticism, he nmst entirely abandon his 

 usual flowing and happy manner of expression, 

 and adopt instead, the style of the statute book — 

 studding and entangling his periods with all the 

 exceptions and provisoes that can be thought of 

 — or take as a serious model, the parentheses with- 

 in parentheses, presented in Gen. Charles Lee's 

 amusing letter concerning his leather breeches. 



My saying "flue or chimney," I supposed would 

 plainly enough indicate a passage by which an}" 

 aeriform fluid could escape, if evolved in contact 

 with one end, and the other end was either out of 

 the earth or less deeply covered by the plough. 

 But this agency is denied to the corn-stalks unless 

 each was a "hollow tube." To the force of this 

 objection I nmst "beg leave to dissent." The al- 

 lusion made was not to unbroken stalks, but to 

 the unrotted stalks ailer having been trodden by 

 cattle — in which state there are not many that 

 have escaped being mashed, and numerous artifi- 

 cial cracks thereby made along the greater part, 

 or whole of their course, through which any fluid 

 might escape, and much more easily a h'ghly elas- 

 tic and compressed gas. But admitting all that is 

 improperly claimed tor the solidity and impene- 

 trability of corn-stalks buried by the plough as 

 manure — even supposing each to be as solid and 

 close as glass or metallic rods, similarly placed — 

 still the loose mould could not so enclose them as 

 not to leave channels or flues for the easy passage 

 of air along the outside of the stalks; and wher- 

 ever a stalk protruded from the soil, or came very 

 near the surtace, an outlet would be oflered — and 

 even if the stalk v%-a3 lying horizontall}-, such a 

 channel, of ibur or five feet in length, would cer- 

 tainly communicate with some fissure leading to 

 the surface. These effects might well take i)lace 

 without one end of the flue being higher than the 

 other, and notwithstanding the closest possible 

 stopping of the ends of the stalks by loose mould. 



Only these three objections, which have been 

 considered, are named by J. M. G. as "what ap- 

 pear to be the faults of J. B's. cnrnmunication" — 

 and whether I have succeeded in removing them, 

 or that Uiey remain in lull force, I may venture to 

 assertjand call on your readers to witness, that there 



has j^ct ap.peared no material or important difl'er- 

 ence in our opinions — and our controversy migfit 

 serve as an example of what slight difl(?rences of 

 opinion on unimp'ortant points, may lead to dispute, 

 and to angry dispute, it' both parties are not as 

 willing to bear and forbear, as I believe that my 

 highly respected opponent is, and as I am sure of 

 ibr myself. 



For the balance of J. M. G's. communication 

 I have only to repeat my acknowledgements lor 

 his praises, with which I have ainjjle cause to be 

 content — and to correct some misapprehension of 

 my meaning into which he seems to have fallen. 

 When he i)roceeds to express his own opinions, 

 on the action of manures, and to discuss things 

 instead of weighing mere ivords, the subject be- 

 comes more worthy of his pen — and every reader, 

 as well as myself, will find more pleasure in ac- 

 companying him through his argument, whether 

 the o))inions expressed, may be approved or 

 not. It is solely v»ath the view of aiding the dis- 

 cussion, and removing some mistakes ot' my own 

 expressions, that I proceed v/ith this communica- 

 tion, and with my quotations — and not because I 

 have the slightest personal objection to any of 

 the expressions on which I may comment. Nor 

 is it deemed necessary to reply to various jeers and 

 flouts, which arc atferwards made to apply to some 

 of the three objections already answered. 



J. M. G. scorns to have considered me as the 

 advocate ibr the universal practice of fermenting 

 winter-made manure in heaps. I certainly incline to 

 the opinion, that in most cases such would be the 

 preferable course, provided every known means is 

 used to guard against waste as inuch as possible. 

 That such waste occurs — and under the usual bad 

 management to an enormous extent — both my 

 former communications testily strongly — ana not 

 only from theory, but also from experiment. It is 

 not a question between fermenting and not fer- 

 menting manure, (as it is often held to be) — but 

 between lermenting in heaps — in the farm-yard 

 without heaping — or affcr being applied to the 

 fields. Act as you please, fermentation must take 

 place — and until it does take place, liir the greater 

 part of the manure must remain insoluble, inert, 

 and possibly injurious. That mode of using ma- 

 nure will be the best which will j^ermit the least 

 waste of the results oflermentalion, and of course 

 offer the most to the use of growing plants. I am 

 not altogether op|)osed to the hypothesis of J. M. 

 G., that the earth attracts and retains these re- 

 sults; but my belief goes on!}' to a certain extent 

 — and that falls far short of all the products offer- 

 mentation Irom a heavy coat of manure — or even 

 from a lighter dressing on soils badly constituted 

 to retain manures. Surely J. M. G. has had ex- 

 perience of the escai.ie and loss (in some way) of 

 so large a part of certain heavy dressings of 

 manure, as to leave little, if any clear profit, Jrom 

 what was saved. Indeed, his own report of the 

 striking and valuable experiment of summer cow- 

 pens ploughed, and proving greatly inferior to 

 others etjually manured and not ploughed, is, 

 enough to show that the earth cannot retain these 

 products of fermentation. I referred particularly 

 to general facts of like kind, (page 502) and 

 gave sufficient reasons, deduced liom the theory of 

 fermentation, why cow-j^ens ploughed in summer 

 should lose more of their manure than when not 

 ploughed. The reasoning v,'as saiislactory to my 



