292 



THE FARMERS' REGISTER; 



to say that, in its very nature, it is a Btrong caus- 

 tic alkali, the natural and direct tendency ot'which 

 is to reduce to their original elements all the sub- 

 stances, both animal and vegetable, to which it is 

 applied. Lime, for instance, finds substances in a 

 solid or liquid stale. It changes them (rom this 

 into the aeriibrra state, and then they pass off in 

 the form of their various gases. Hence its great 

 efficacy as a cleanser of stercoraries, and other 

 ofl^ensive collections ol decaying matter. The 

 ammonia is speedily driven ott, and the residuum 

 is left in a sweet and harmless state. If then this 

 be the direct tendency of lime, it seems to me to 

 be the very last thing to make manures more 

 permanent. Instead of _/i.xi7)g them in the soil, 

 it decomposes them, and the gases being set at 

 liberty, will make iheir escape. 



Now whilst stating the above, 1 readily admit 

 that applications of lime to coarse unlermcnted 

 manures, may be of very great service, (m.) 

 Manures in this state decompose very slowly. 

 It is also of very great service to lands filled with 

 turf and other vegetable matter, in an inert state. 

 Such manures commonly decompose very slowly. 

 If they evolve their gases at all, they do it so 

 slowly as to furnish very little nutriment to grow- 

 ing vegetation. Hence it is that no judicious 

 farmer expects much innncdiaie benefit from ap- 

 plications of coarse materials from his farm -pen, 

 or from dry straw or dry litter from the woods. 

 It is now pretty well ascertained, that it is the 

 gases, and the gases alone, which nourish our 

 crops, and that these are evolved only during 

 actual decomposition. Now, with manures of 

 this kind, lime must be very useful. It hastens 

 a process which would otherwise be slow, and 

 the crop being already on the land, takes up the 

 gases as they are set at liberty, and thus receives 

 benefit. It is in this way that I account for the 

 fact that in the few applications of lime I liave 

 made, one was successful, the others were mor- 

 tifying failures. The succeeslijl application was 

 on land newly cleared, covered with litter, and 

 filled with small fibrous roots. Here the lime 

 had vegetable matter to act upon, and the grow- 

 ing crop derived the benefit iiom the rapid de- 

 composition, which the lime caused it to under- 

 go. In the other instances, the land was naked, 

 or nearly so, and the lime fiaving nothing to 

 act upon, no gases were evolved, and consequent- 

 ly no food was furnished to the crop ; and as 

 might naturally be expected, the whole affair, 

 expenses, labor and all, terminated in a "splen- 

 did failure." I would not therefore hesitate to 

 recommend considerable applications of lime to 

 forests to be speedily cleared, or even to old fields 

 pretty thickly covered with young pines, which 

 it is intended to reclaim. Then I would leave 

 the brush and other litter, lor at least one year; 

 after which, 1 should expect to bring the land 

 into successful cultivation, not by fixing these 

 materials in the soil, but by eubjecting them to a 

 rapid decomposition, and thus (il I may be allow- 

 ed the expression,) unfixing them. 



But perhaps the editor and other writers who 

 are Ibnd of this term fixing, may mean something 

 else. They may mean that lime, where manure or 

 other vegetable matter already exists in some 

 form, does, by rapidly decomposing the same, sa- 

 turate the soil with fertilizing gases, and thus 

 impart a vigor which will enable it to throw up a 



strong crop of vegetation, which, falling and de- 

 caying on the land, will not only keep it in good 

 heart, but actually improve it. In this way the 

 original manure has not been fixed or made per- 

 manent, but it has imparted to the land a vigor 

 and lijrtility which enabled it to cover itself with 

 a strong crop of vegetation, and this, in its turn, 

 decaying on the land, makes that fertility perma- 

 nent. If this be the meaning, I give it my hearty 

 concurrence ; and thus it falls in with my theory 

 on which I slightly touched in one of my former 

 numbers. But then it ought to be borne in mind, 

 that lime does not make the manure permanent; 

 it merely hastens that process by which the ma- 

 nure is changed from an inactive to an active 

 state, and then a permanency of fertility is in- 

 sured by successive crops of vigorous vegetation. 

 Instead, therelore, of the limejfix/ng the manure, 

 the manure is fixed by means of successive crops 

 ol' vegetation, which constantly rising up and then 

 decaying on the land, make lertility permanent. 

 It is these constant additions and accumulations 

 of manure which can by any possibility fix or 

 make them lasting. The idea therefore I wish to 

 convey is simply this, that no applications of lime 

 on a previous manuring can so fix that manure as 

 to render subsequent manurings unnecessary. On 

 the other hand, if the crops be removed and no 

 equivalent be returned, the land will constantly 

 decline, so that, instead of firiiig the manure in 

 the soil, we shall fix something there which we 

 will find infinitely worse, (n.) 



Or perhaps the meaning of this term may be 

 that lime is specially ueefiil in neutralizing or de- 

 stroying that principle in acid lands, which seems 

 to render applications of manure to such lands al- 

 most useless. Now I pretend not to say what 

 that principle is. It may be acidity itself, or it 

 may be something else which always abounds in 

 acid lands. But be it what it may. there is some- 

 thing in such lands, as every observant farmer 

 well knows, which seems to dissipate and scatter 

 to the four winds his manure, almost as fast as 

 he applies it. The whole fertilizing effects of the 

 manure seem to be exhausted upon one single 

 crop, so that the land is almost as poor at the end 

 of the year as it was at the beginning. I have 

 some such land, and I have often wished it waa 

 in the moon, or any where else out of my sight. 

 It cost me just as much as the best land I own, 

 and I hereby offer to give it to any one who will 

 take it away, so that it may never harass my 

 sight or purse any more, (o.) 



Some persons are of the opinion that manure 

 sinks in such land. But 1 cannot think this cor- 

 rect, for, on examination, I find that if it have 

 any foundation at all, it is a hard pan so obdurate 

 that it can scarcely be penetrated, even with the 

 pickaxe. Tliis being the case, I cannot admit 

 the idea that the manure sinks. I rather incline 

 to the opinion that the manure is dissipated, 

 and thus rises up and goes off, not in the form of 

 ammonia, but of some other gases which do not 

 nourish vegetation. But be this as it may, a 

 question ol much more importance is, how is this 

 evil to be remedied'? Can this malady be cured 

 by lime? Or is it to be ranked with cancer, con- 

 sumption, and other incurable diseases which af- 

 flict the human body? 



But we often meet with acid lands, which are 

 not imbedded on a hard-pan substratum. IMost 



