3P O F xM A N U R E S. .HIV Pai*ri. 



of agriculture in Britain in his days ; and whoever will be at the 

 pains to read what he fays on that head, will have fufficient reafon to 

 think, that we are ftill far below the point to which the Romans had 

 then brought it in this ifland : and this, I believe, cannot be faid of 

 any other art or fcience, which, like this, is independent of what is 

 called genius, or of the powers of the imagination. In all others of 

 this kind, we excel, not only our neighbours, but every nation that 

 has gone before us j men of every rank and order lending a helping 

 hand to forv/ard and improve this art, or that fcience. But agricul- 

 ture, which was the favourite employment of the greateft Roman 

 fenator, in his retreat from bulinefs, has (till of late) with us been 

 left to the feeble eiforts of the poor and illiterate peafant. What elfe, 

 for example, but their grofs ignorance and inattention, can account 

 for the negled: of ufmg marie in the improvement of particular foils ? 

 Pliny fpeaks of it as a particular fpecies of improvement, which 

 obtained in Britain and Gaul. He calls it the fat of the earth, and 

 compares it to the glands in the human body, which are lapped ih 

 a coat of fat: as this pra6tice (it would feem) was not ufed in Italy, 

 it ihews us how attentive the Romans were to agriculture, where- 

 ever they carried their arms ; lince, notwithflanding the continual 

 alarms, thej! lived in from the natives here and in Gaul, they 

 found time to difcover and perfed: a fpecies of improvement par- 

 ticularly fuited to the foil and climate, and, of all others, the cheap- 

 eft and moft 1 ailing. 



We mufl farther obferve, with Dr. Home, that there is a body 

 very fimilar to marie in its appearance, but very different from it in 

 its effects, and often found in the fame bed with the beft marie. It is 

 of a darkifli lead colour. Inftead of fertilizing the ground, it renders 

 the beft foils incapable of bearing any kind of vegetables for many. 

 years. I have feen, fays that gentleman, the fpots on which it was 

 laid, entirely barren three years after. I have heard of its bad 

 effe(5ts continuing in other places for a much longer time; nor is it 

 certainly known when they will ceafe. A body fo very deftruftive 

 to agriculture, deferves to be well charafterifed, in order to be 

 fhunned i and well examined, that we may know whence proceeds 

 this noxious quality, and how to cure it when it has taken place." - ' 



Marie takes a fmooth poliHi from the inftruments with which it 



is wrought. A piece of this taken up, which has not been much ex- 



pofed to the influence of the air, differs greatly in tafte, from marie. 



Infteadof the fmooth unduous tafte of the latter, it is acid, and re- 



. , , markably 



