MIDDLESEX SOCIETY. 173 



for top-dressingj I made, from that time to the last of May, 

 1849, two hundred and twenty-one large cart loads, which I 

 carted out in April and May, on land for sowing and planting 

 with spring grain. From June 1st, to September 1st, I manu- 

 factured and threw in a pile, one hundred and forty-eight large 

 cart loads, which Avas viewed by the committee on farms, and 

 judged by them, to contain two hundred loads. This last lot 

 was carted out for top-dressing grass land, and I have nearly as 

 much more in preparation. 



My mode of making compost manure, is, to take the ashes 

 of two hundred cords of peat, which is burnt every year, to 

 bleach stock and dry paper, in my paper manufactory. To 

 these ashes, I add all waste peat that is too small to burn, and 

 peat muck brought from the bog, and loam collected from 

 different parts of the farm, which I put into a reservoir, dug 

 in the ground for the purpose. It held but two loads at first, 

 now it holds twenty, which we can make as quickly as we 

 could two loads, except the time of putting in and taking out. 

 I fill the reservoir full with these materials, then let off three 

 thousand gallons of boiling hot ley, twice a week, made from 

 lime and soda ash, which will decompose all sods and lumps of 

 peat, better in ten days, than they would be in a heap or barn 

 yard, in a year. In two weeks it is fit to top dress any mowing 

 land I have, and on some land, I have thought it almost equal 

 to the best compost I can make in my yard. Still, I cart about 

 all of it to the yard, and place it in the barn cellar, as I think 

 it helps the green manure as much as it is helped by it, or 

 more. I spread first, a layer of one, then of another, of the 

 different kinds which I have. I add the night soil, from five 

 out-houses, which are cleared twice a year, with which is 

 mixed a considerable quantity of leached chloride of lime, left 

 from bleaching paper stock. 



I seldom keep more than one yoke of oxen, six cows and 

 two horses. I can make manure easier than find hog-flesh to 

 make it, so I keep but two hogs. In the summer, I have all 

 the droppings from my cattle and horses, cleaned up and mixed 

 with the stuff from the reservoir, once a week. In this way I 

 have no manure dry up or heat, and my barn yard is kept per- 



