MANURES. 211 



Equally disregarding the same lessons, we, with a newer soil, 

 and a more remote necessity for economy, so long as the crops of 

 our fields bring present money, are heedless of future want for our- 

 selves or for posterity. 



In the "American Agricultural Annual" for 1868, there was 

 published an article of mine on " Sewers and Earth Closets, and 

 their Relation to Agriculture," from which article the following 

 is extracted : — 



" The average population of New York City — including its 

 *' temporary visitors — is, probably, not less than 1,000,000. This 

 " population consumes food equivalent to at least 30,000,000 

 *' bushels of corn in a year. Except the small proportion that is 

 *' stored up in the bodies of the growing young, which is fully off- 

 *■'■ set by that contained in the bodies of the dead, the constituents 

 "of the food are returned to the air by the lungs and skin, or are 

 " voided as excrement. That which goes to the air was originally 

 *' taken from the air by vegetation, and will be so taken again — 

 *■'■ here is no waste. The excrement contains all that was furnished 

 *'by the mineral elements of the soil on which the food was pro- 

 " duced. This all passes into the sewers, and is washed into the 

 '* sea. Its loss, to the present generation, is complete. 



" In the present half-developed condition of the world, there is 

 " no help for this. The first duty in all towns is to remove from 

 " the vicinity of habitations all matters which by their rlecomposi- 

 ** tion would tend to produce disease. The question of health is, 

 ** of course, of the first importance, and that of economy must fol- 

 *' low it ; — but it should follow closely, and perfect civilization 

 *'must await its solution. 



" Thirty million bushels of corn contain, among other minerals, 

 *' nearly seven thousand tons of phosphoric acid, and this amount 

 " is annually lost in the wasted night-soil of New York City.* 



* " Other mineral constituents of food — important ones, too — are washed away in even 

 "greater quantities through the same channels ; but this element is the be;t for illustra- 

 " tion, because its effect in manure is the most striking, even so small a dressing as 

 " twenty pounds per acre producing a marked effect on all cereal crops. Ammonia, too, 

 "which is so important that it is usual in England to estimate the value of manure in 

 " exact proportion to its supply of this element, is largely yielded by human excrement." 



