70 



positions, the foreigner steps in and supplies them 

 when they are highly remunerative to the growtr. 

 Many acres of poor sandy soils, valueless for other 

 purposes, but which at one time ranked among the 

 most remunerative for early potato culture, have now 

 gone out of cultivation because it no longer pays to 

 cultivate them for that purpose. On the Greensand 

 near Potton, in Bedfordshire, is a considerable tract 

 of this kind. On this dressings of London dung, from 

 40 to 60 tons per acre, were applied, solely to produce 

 early potatoes. The soil is almost completely com- 

 posed of sand, and the manurial and mechanical 

 properties of a fertile soil had to be placed in it, and 

 for this purpose dung was most suitable. It now 

 grows gorse and fern. 



From 20 to 30 tons of dung is a good dressing per 

 acre on land in moderate condition. London dung, 

 50 miles by rail and a mile cartage into the field, costs 

 from six to seven shillings a ton to put on the land. 

 The dressing is therefore expensive. Home-made 

 manure saves the cost of railway carriage, and if 

 the cattle which have manufactured it have paid a 

 good profit for feeding, the cost is light. If, however, 

 the straw from which it was made was grown at a loss, 

 and the cattle did not pay for feeding, it is expensive. 



Chemical Constituents necessary to apply. 



The cost of dung is that for which it can be made 

 or purchased. It cannot, however, be put at less than 

 five shillings per ton on the land, even under the 



