}g4 CALCAREOUS MANURES-PKACTICE. 



practice, and also that of Mr. Taylor and Mr. Hankins, in connexion with 

 much worse farming, it is certain that neither of these individuals had the 

 least idea of the true action of marl ; and they were indebted to their good 

 fortune, more than to any exercise of reasoning, that they received profit- 

 able returns, and did no injury by marling. They all three applied their 

 putrescent manures with the marl. But though this was the safest and 

 most beneficial plan, the thus uniting them prevented the separate action 

 and value of putrescent and calcareous manures being known, compared, 

 and duly appreciated. 



'* My own application of marl, on Coggins Point farm, Prince George 

 county, which in 1818 extended only to 15 acres, (of which but 3 or 4 

 were under the crop of that year,) by 1821 had been increased to above 

 80 acres a year, and so continued until nearly all the then arable land on 

 that farm requiring it, (more than 600 acres,) had been covered. In 1821, 

 my earliest publication on the subject was made. Though the facts and 

 reasoning thus made known by that time were beginning to attract much 

 notice, and to induce many persons to begin to marl, still it was some 

 years later before incredulity and ridicule had generally given place to full 

 confidence in the value of the improvement. Even at this time, wheri 

 nearly 25 years of my own experience of marling and its benefits have 

 passed, and the results are open to public notice and scrutiny, not half the 

 persons who could marl are engaged at it, or are marling to but little pur- 

 pose ; and of all who are using marl, nineteen in twenty are proceeding 

 injudiciously, without regard to the mode of operation of the manure, and 

 therefore are either doing harm, or losing profit, almost as often, though in 

 less degree, as doing good. At this time, however, there are scarcely any 

 persons, however negligent in practice, who do not fully admit the great 

 value and certain profit of applying marl wherever it is found. 



" But with all the existing neglect of using this means of fertilization, and 

 with all the still worse ignorance of or inattention to its manner of ope- 

 rating, there never has been a new improvement in agriculture more ra- 

 pidly extended, or with such beneficial and profitable results. In Prince 

 George county, there is not one farmer having marl on or near his land, 

 who has not applied it to greater or less extent, and always with more or 

 less profit— and, in most cases, largely as well as profitably. In James 

 City county there has been perhaps the next largest as well as the oldest 

 practice. In York county, as in James City, some of the most valuable 

 and profitable improvements by marling have been made. And some of 

 the farms of both counties, adjoining Williamsburg, and having the benefit 

 of putrescent town manures, show, more strikingly than any others known, 

 the remarkable power of calcareous manure to fix the putrescent in the 

 soil, and make them more elficient and far more durable. In Surry, Isle of 

 Wight, Nansemond, Charles City, New Kent, Hanover, King William, King 

 and Q,ueen, Gloucester, and Middlesex counties, in the middle of the marl 

 region of Virginia, marl has been already extensively applied, and the pro- 

 fits therefrom are annually increasing. And in other surrounding counties, 

 worse supplied with marl, the practice has been carried on in proportion to 

 the facilities, and to the more scanty experience and degree of information 

 on the subject. It would be a most important statistical fact, if it could be 

 ascertained how much land in Virginia has already been marled. The 

 quantity however is very great ; and all the land marled has been thereby 

 increased in 7iet product, on the general average, fully 8 bushels of corn or 

 oats, or 4 bushels of wheat— and the land increased in intrinsic value fully 

 200 per cent, on its previous value or market price. Where the marling 

 has been judiciously conducted, these rates of increase have been more 



