106 



THE FARMERS' REGISTER. 



the accuracy with which his land is meaeured and j 

 his manures and crops weighed. 1 have taken I 

 20 ions oflarm-yHi'd manure aa a standard, though 

 in many highly farmed pans of the country no 

 more than 15 tons are usually applied. Twenty 

 bushels of bones are reconuueiided by the Don- 

 caster report, and I have lately found that in the 

 Lothians 1 cvvt. of rape-dust is considered to 

 replace 1 ton of (arm-yard manure. This propor- 

 tion of course will vary with the quality of the 

 latter manure ; but, whatever quantity of this lat- 

 ter we take as the standard of comparison, it is easy 

 to adjust the proportions of the other subsiances 

 accordingly. I have not recommended any trial 

 to be made with more than 6 cwt. of guano, be- 

 cause, where farm-yard manure is valued only 

 at 6s. or 7s. per ton, 5 cwt. of the Ibrmer would 

 cost as much as 20 tons oj" the latter. 



The above experiments are intended 1o be made 

 with the green crop and continued during an 

 entire rotation ;* any pair of them, however, may 

 be tried on single crops, whether of corn or of 

 turnips and potatoes. In this way it ought also 

 to be tried against nitrate of soda and against 

 bones, upon seeds and upon old grass-lands. 

 The modes in which such expeiiraenis may be 

 made will readily suggest themselves to the in- 

 telligent farmer. In all cases the results should be 

 accurately recorded, andjf possible published. 



I consider it of importance that an artificial 

 mixture, similar to tliat above suggested, ol which 

 the composition is known, and which can any- 

 where and by any one easily be made, should be 

 fairly tried against the guano ;t because it does 

 not appear, as some have been led to believe, that 

 the supply of this substance on the coast of Peru 

 ia by any means inexhaustible. 



According to Mr. Winterleldt the supply of 

 recent guano has diminished materially even in 

 recent times ; and in an extract from his letter 

 already given he mentions one extensive deposite 

 o( the'old guano in the island of Iquique, which 

 was exhausted in 25 years by the local consump- 

 tion only. 



But the diminution ia placed in a stronger light 

 by Mariano de Rivero, in a paper published in 

 the Spanish language, but (rom which an extract 

 is given in Ferussac's Bulletin (sec. I., torn, xi., 

 p. 84.) He says — 



"The Spaniards permitted the wise ordinances 

 of the Incas, which ensured the preservation ol 

 this valuable manure, to be entirely forgotten. 

 The Peruvians are now aware of this great error, 

 and see with anxiety the period approaching 

 Tvhen the guano will no longer be obtained in 

 Bufficient quantity to meet the demands of the 

 agriculture of the country. The discovery of 

 new deposites of the brown guano, which is of very 

 ancient origin, is daily becoming more rare, while 



• By this 1 mean that the effect of these several 

 manures applied once for all to the green crop at the 

 commeiicemeiit of the rotation, should be traced on 

 each succtssive crop through the entire course ol 

 cropping. 



1 1 have not suggested the comparative trial of such 

 substances as those sold under the name of urate, ani- 

 malized carbon. See, because, though I have no doubt 

 of their efficacy when prepared after a certain manner, 

 yet the practical farrapr has no guaranty that what he 

 purchases this year shall prove equal in virtue to that 

 which he applied to his land in a former season. 



the production of the recent white guano is ra- 

 pidly diminishing, since, through the freedom of 

 commerce, so many vessels have visited the coast 

 and scared the birds which Irequenled them."* 



If the above account is correct, ii is the interest 

 of Peru to prohibit the exportation of the guano ; 

 but the introduction of it into this country in the 

 mean lime will prove a great national service, if 

 it shall teach us to imitate so valuable a natural 

 production, and, by making available those ar- 

 ticles of home manufacture which have hiiherto 

 been neglected by the agriculturist, to supply the 

 lack of fidrm-yard manure, and thereby to raise 

 a greater amount of food than we should other- 

 wise be able to do. Thus at the same time will 

 the chemical arts and the art of culture be bound 

 together by still another tie, and the mutual de- 

 pendence of all classes of the community, how- 

 ever apparently distinct their industrial occupa- 

 tions, be still more distinctly illustrated. 



Durham, 20th October, 1841. 



1HE CULTURE OF SUGAR. 



From Uie Pliiladelpliia Public Ledger. 



Until the production of sugar Irora the maple, 

 and more recently from beete, the production of 

 this 7Jeccssary ol human file was supposed to be 

 confined to the tropics. But though maple su- 

 gar is the produce of temperate regions, its 

 cultivation is necessarily too limited lo super- 

 sede extensively the use of tropical or cane 

 sugar, and this cultivation must decline with the 

 settlement of the country. Most of the trees 

 which aflbrd sugar are found in the primitive 

 forests ; and as thirty years at least are requir- 

 ed to produce a maple tree of sufficient size for 

 sugar, the cultivation of sugar orchards by the 

 present generation, for its own use, is impracti- 

 cable, and we cannot expect that a people will 

 labor for posterity, in a new country which de- 

 mands all their labor for themselves in immedi- 

 ate returns. We may add that in our mode of 

 clearing land of forests by fire as well as steel, 

 the preservation of the spontaneous growth of 

 maples is out of the question. Therefore we can 

 only manuliicture maple sugar in new settle- 

 ments and by an expenditure of labor that 

 might be more profitably employed. The whole 

 quantity of sugar produced in the United States 

 in 1840, was 155 millions of pounds. Of this 

 quantity, Louisiana produced about 120 millions, 

 Georgia about 330,000, and Florida about 275,0:^0 

 pounds, the whole of which was doubtless cane 

 sugar. This quantity, about 120^ millions, de- 

 ducted from the whole quantity, leaves 34J mil- 

 lions lor maple and beet sugar. Of this quan- 

 tity, New York produced 10 millions, Pennsyl- 

 vania about 2^ millions, Virginia about 1^ mil- 

 lion, Kentucky about li, million, Ohio about 

 6^ millions, Indiana about 3^ millions, and 

 Michigan about 1^ million ; and of these 34^ mil- 

 lions, the whole was maple sugar, excepting, 

 perhaps, a small quantity produced in Pennsyl- 

 vania, in the vicinity of this city. The whole of 

 this sugar was consumed at home ; for notwith- 

 standing all this production, 120 millions of 



, ♦ See Poggendorf's Annalen, vol. xxi. p. 606, 



