32 OFMANURES. Part I. 



The dung of horfes and mules is an admirable fertilizer : but care 

 muft be taken not to lay too much of it on corn lands, becaufe it 

 produces abundance of ftraw. 



Horfe-dung, being of a very hot nature, is beft for cold lands, 

 and cow dung for hot lands ; and being mixed together, may make 

 a very good manure for moft forts of foils, and for fome they may 

 be mixed with earth. 



The dung of pigeons and fowls is fo rich, that it is generally ufed 

 for a drefling to plants whilft they are growing. That of pigeons, 

 fays Mr. Miller, is the beft fuperficial improvement that can be laid 

 on meadow or corn land : but before it is ufed, it ought to have lain 

 abroad out of the dove-houfe fome time, that the air may have a little 

 fweetened it, and mollified the fiery heat that is in thefe dungs. 



The dung of poultry being hot and full of falts, tends much to 

 facilitate vegetation : and is abundantly quicker in its operation, 

 than the dung of animals which feed on herbs. 



To animal fubftances belong all parts of their bodies, as flefli, 

 blood, fl-iavings of bones, hoofs, rags of their wool or hair, &c. 



Mr. Evelyn fays, the blood and flefli of animals is much more 

 powerful for the enriching of land, than their dung and excrements, 

 and is computed at twenty times the advantage; and to the fame ad- 

 vance above this, is hair and calcined bones. Woollen rags are pecu- 

 liarly ufeful for light foils. They fhould be chopt fmall, about an 

 inch or two fquare, and fcattered on the earth at the fecond plowing; 

 for being thereby covered, they will begin to rot by feed time. They 

 imbibe the moiilure of dews and rain, and retain it long ; and, as Dr. 

 Home obferves, thereby keep light foils in a moifl ftate. The fame 

 may be faid of the hoofs of cattle, when fet upright in the earth, as 

 Mr. Ellis direds. They hold the rain that drops into them, and it 

 putrifies there, till, being worked out by fucceeding fliov.'ers, it falls 

 upon the furrounding earth, and communicates a great fertility to it. 

 — Sea-fliells may likewife be included under this head: .but we have 

 already fpoken of them, in the article Clay. 



Vegetables afford great abundance of excellent manure. The cuf- 

 tom of plowing in green fucculent plants, is very ancient. All the 

 Rom.an authors fpeak of it particularly. Buck wheat and vetches are 

 the two plants molt frequently fown in England for that purpole ; 

 and the time of plowing them in, is when they are in bloom, being 

 then in their mod fucculent flate. Some farmers plow. in their 

 fecond crop of clover, to enrich the lami for wheat in the autumn, 



Tliis 



