MAN 



THE UNIVERSAL HERBAL; 



MAN 



be fed in the spring, when the value of such feed will be 

 great, and the dung, by means of such a covering, will be 

 guarded against the frost in the best possible manner. Mr. 

 Miller/4iowever, reprobates the dressing of grass ground in 

 summer, soon after the crop of hay is taken off the land: 

 because before Michaelmas the sun will have exhaled most 

 of the goodness, if the dressing be of dung, or any other 

 soft manure. It is mostly the custom to collect manure of 

 every description into one heap. Hence substances very 

 opposite in their nature, and which may be wanted at dif- 

 ferent times and for different purposes, are laid together, and, 

 instead of forming a useful combination, perhaps prevent the 

 dung from fermenting as it ought. Every farmer therefore 

 should have at least two or three dunghills, to be prepared 

 for use, according to the time at which the contents of each 

 may be wanted, and the articles of which they are respectively 

 composed. If earth, moss, shovellings of highways, &c. 

 can be procured, the bottom of any dunghill composed of 

 rank stable-dung, or short excremental dung, may be laid 

 three or four feet deep with these substance's. This will 

 increase ihe quantity of manure, for the moisture that is 

 pressed out during the fermentation will sink into the earth, 

 i.e. and impregnate it with its salts ; and if the whole be after- 

 wards turned and incorporated, what was laid in the bottom 

 will be found of nearly equal value with the dung itself. 



Some distinctions are to be made respecting the different 

 sorts of animal dung. Horse-dung, is more distinguished 

 for the readiness with which it ferments, than for its intrinsic 

 richness. Stable-muck, or horse-dung mixed with straw, 

 properly fermented, is of primary use in the kitchen-garden, 

 where it supplies the want of the sun's heat in winter; afford- 

 ing at an early season many esculent plants, which we could 

 otherwise have only for a short time in the middle of summer, 

 and others which our moist and cold climate could not pro- 

 duce at all in any perfection; as Asparagus, Cucumbers, 

 Melons, Colliflowers, Salad-herbs, &c. &c. See Hot-beds. 

 Horse-dung is certainly one of the best improvements for 

 cold lands that can be procured in any quantity, yet alone, 

 when it is too new, it is prejudicial to some plants; and if 

 it be spread thin over lands in the summer, it is of very little 

 service, because the sun draws all the goodness out of it, 

 and it becomes little better than thatch or dry straw. Although 

 too much of it can scarcely be used in a kitchen-garden, yet 

 it may be a fault to lay too much on corn-land, because it 

 may be apt to make the corn run too much to straw. In 

 very moist cold land, crops will succeed better if new horse- 

 dung, as it comes from the stable, be buried in it, than if the 

 ground be dressed with very rotten dung. Horse-dung in a 

 raw state is well calculated for Potatoes, because it leaves 

 room for the roots of that plant to spread; but if it be not 

 fermented, it contains much undigested vegetable matter, and 

 consequently the seeds of many weeds which may have been 

 mixed with the food of the animal. Cow-dung, is very useful 

 for lean, dry, hot, shady, or gravelly soils. The excre-ment 

 of a ruminating animal is held to be preferable to that of 

 horses at grass, owing to the quantity of animal juices mixed 

 with t'heir food in chewing; but since it does not contain 

 much undigested matter, it will hardly heat. The best way 

 of managing it, is to lay it together, and keep it moist till it 

 be sufficiently putrified. Mixed with mud, it makes a good 

 manure for some soils; and for almost any, when mixed with 

 horse-dung. -Sheep's dung and Deer's dung do not differ 

 much in quality, and are esteemed by some persons as the 

 best manure for cold clays. Others recommend them to be 

 used as top-dressings to autumn and spring crops, four or 

 five loads to an acre, in the same manner with ashes, malt- 



dust, &c. Hogs' or Swine's dung is the fattest and most bene- 

 ficial of all the animal dungs; one load, it is said, will go as 

 far as two loads of other dung. It is commonly asserted, that 

 the dung is richer in proportion as the animal is fatter; and 

 being of an oily and saponaceous quality, is excellent for 

 arable lands, but should be used cautiously, because it is apt 

 to be full of weeds. It is the best suited for fruit-trees, espe- 

 cially apples and pears iri a light soil, and a very rich manure 

 for grass. Mr. Miller declares he has often used it to fruit- 

 trees when it was well rotted, and found it the most bene- 

 ficial of any manure. Rabbits' dung, appears, by an expe- 

 riment of Mr. Arthur Young, to be superior even to that of 

 pigeons, and to last the longest. But this experiment should 

 be repeated, before we can give credit to what seems impro- 

 bable. Dung of Birds. Pigeons' dung is certainly a rich 

 manure, but not lasting; it must therefore be renewed the 

 oftener. It is most applicable to cold and deep stiff land. 

 Sometimes it is sown upon wheat-crops in the spring. It 

 should always be broken very small, and sown during moist 

 weather; and if circumstances will admit of its being har- 

 rowed in, so much the better. Poultry manure is of the same 

 nature, and, where it can be had in any quantity, is an excel- 

 lent top-dressing, particularly for cold land. The dung of 

 pigeons, poultry, and geese, is also a great improver of mea- 

 dow lands: but before it is used, it ought to lie abroad some 

 time, that the air may sweeten it a little, and mollify the 

 fiery heat of these dungs. They should be dried before they 

 are strewed, being apt to clod in wet; and they ought to be 

 mixed with sand, earth, or ashes, to keep them from clinging 

 together, that they may be strewed thin, being naturally very 

 hot and strong. They are recommended as the best manure 

 for Asparagus, Strawberries, and any sort of flowers; but 

 for the latter, they should be well rotted, and mixed with 

 earth. They are also said to be good for trees, the leaves of 

 which are apt to turn yellow; and for this purpose should be 

 spread an inch thick at the foot of the tree in autumn. Con- 

 siderable quantities of valuable manure might be raised by 

 those who, living near large commons, keep great flocks of 

 geese, if they were regularly housed at night, and the place 

 were littered with straw, fern, saw-dust, ashes, or sand. The 

 same advantage might be reaped by littering the places where 

 other kinds of poultry roost. Every three or four weeks the 

 places should be cleaned out, and the dung laid in heaps to 

 (erment, either alone or mixed with soil. Night Soil, or 

 Privy Manure, says Mortimer, is of all sorts of dung the 

 greatest improver of land, especially if mixed wifh other 

 dung, straw, or earth, to give it a fermentation, and to ren- 

 der it convenient for carriage. It sells in foreign parts at a 

 much greater rate than any other sorts of manure, and may be 

 bou-ght in London for five shillings a load. In China and 

 Japan, wonderful attention is paid to saving this manure, 

 which in those countries is preferred to all others, both on 

 account of its richness, and its being free from weeds: inso- 

 much that Thunberg, the famous botanist, passing through 

 Japan with the Dutch embassy, could scarcely find any other 

 plants in the corn-fields but the corn itself. In those countries 

 the law prohibits the waste of human excrement; and every 

 house has reservoirs for it, to the great annoyance of the 

 traveller through their towns. Mr. Young has found the 

 effect of night-soil (from 160 to 320 bushels per acre) pro- 

 digious, trebling the produce on lands unmanured: and he 

 asserts, that in all the experiments he has made with this 

 manure, he has found the result almost uniform. In a mea- 

 dow lately laid down, and in very poor condition, two acres 

 of the worst part being covered after hay-time with four wag- 

 gon loads of night-soil, unmixed with any thing, and spread 



