ADAPT MANURES TO SOILS. 207 



hold the urine ; and that is sufficient ; there we get a good 

 mixture. But in the otlier case, I want the sand ; I don't want 

 the clear loam. There is some property about the sand which 

 produces grass there. So that I can agree perfectly with the 

 last speaker, and with Mr. Thompson. 



Then, again, we cannot tell exactly how much dirt or sand 

 to mix with the manure until we see the soil ; then we can 

 judge pretty nearly how to mix it. That seems to me the only 

 safe way. As my friend Clement said, this discussion is to go 

 out to the public, but it decides nothing. Can we decide any- 

 thing ? I do not see how we can decide anything, or settle the 

 question how deep we are to plough, how much peat it will 

 do to put into the soil, or anything else. I have no peat. My 

 neighbors have it, and have used it pretty extensively, but they 

 have left off using it now, the expense of carting lias got to be 

 so heavy. We have to pay two dollars a day for labor, and it 

 costs so much to cart the peat that they have given it up. It 

 is used mostly for orchards. One near me, consists of two 

 hundred and fifty trees. They have been in the habit of tipping 

 up peat on tliat ground, and now it is stocked down with clover, 

 and produces very heavy crops. It has had no manure 

 whatever for twenty years. 



Mr. Smith. I wish to make a statement to correct what I 

 have said before. I think I said I applied gas lime to one acre. 

 I should, have said two acres instead of one. 



Mr. Davis. I merely rise to corroborate, so far as my opin- 

 ion goes, some of the remarks which have just fallen from Mr. 

 Johnson. It seems to me that the more important question for 

 us, in regard to manure, is, the kind of manure that is to be 

 applied to particular soils. I merely wish, in that connection, 

 to state my experience upon that matter. I have a peat 

 meadow, where the peat is some twelve feet deep. A few years 

 ago, when a portion of it was laid down, being ploughed once, 

 I put some gravel upon it, and got a heavy crop, which in two 

 or three years fell off into fine, very thick set meadow grass, 

 without stamina, very hard to cut ; it could not be cut by the 

 mowing machine, on account of the fineness of the grass and its 

 want of stamina. I thought this want of stamina was entirely 

 owing to the want of silicate in the soil ; and in order to test 

 the matter, as far as I could, I last year put on a heavy dressing 



