386 MANURE MUST BE ADDED WHERE LIME ABOUNDS. 



this metliod ; but there seems every reason to believe that it vi^ill best 

 reward those who feel themselves at liberty to follow tbff indications at 

 once of sound theory and of enlightened practice. 



One thing, however, must be borne in mind by those who, in adopt- 

 ing the best system of liming, do not wish both to injure their land and 

 to meet with ultimate disappointment. Organic matter — in the form of 

 farm-yard manure, of bone or rape dust, of green crops ploughed in, or 

 of peat, and oth'er composts — must be abundantly and systematically 

 added, if at the end of 20 or 40 years the land in which the full supply 

 of lime is kept up is to retain its original fertility. High farming is the 

 most profitable — for the soil is ever grateful for skilful treatment — but 

 he who farms high in the sense of keeping up the supply of lime, must 

 eAso farm high in the sense of keeping up the supply of organic and 

 other manures in the soil — otherwise present fertility and gain will be 

 followed by future barrenness and loss. If this is not to be done, it 

 were better to add lime at long intervals, since as the quantity of lime 

 diminishes, the land begins to enjoy a little respite, and has had time in 

 some measure to recover itself — the cropping in both instances being the 

 same — before the new dose is laid upon its surface.* 



§ 12. Form and state of combination in which lime ought to be 

 applied to the land. 



The form and state of combination in which lime ought to be applied 

 to the land depend upon the nature of the soil, on the kind of cropping 

 to which it is subjected, and on the special purpose which the lime is 

 intended to effect. The soil may be heavy or light, in arable culture, 

 or laid down to grass, and each of these conditions indicates a different 

 mode of procedure in the application of lime. So the lime itself may 

 be intended either to act more immediately or to be more permanent in 

 its action — or it may be applied for the purpose of destroying unwhole- 

 some herbage, of quickening inert vegetable matter, of generally sweet- 

 ening the soil, or simply of adding to the land a substance which is in- 

 dispensable to its fertility. The skilful agriculturist will modify the 

 form and mode of application according as it is intended to serve one or 

 other of these purposes- 



From the considerations already presented to you (§ 3 ) in regard to 

 the changes which quick-lime undergoes in the air, it appears to be ex- 

 pedient, 



1°. To slake lime quickly, and to apply it immediately upon clay, 

 boggy, marshy, or peaty lands — upon such also as contain much inert 

 or generally which abound in other forms of vegetable matter. 



2°. To bents and heaths which it is desirable to extirpate, it should 

 be applied in the same caustic state, or to unwholesome subsoils which 

 contain much iron (sulphate of iron), as soon as they are turned up by 

 the plough. In both these cases the unslaked lime-dust from the kilns 

 might be laid on with advantage. 



* " In the neighbourhood of Taunton, in Somersetshire, and over all the soil of the new 

 red sandstone, the farmers lime their land every time it comes4n course of fallow for tur- 

 nips, and this produces excellent crops, even without dung." — Morton on Soils-, third edition, 

 p. 181. The practical reader must not consider this custom of the Somersetshire farmers 

 as at all at variance with what is stated in the text : he must conclude, rather,— if the sen- 

 tence here quoted is meant to apply that they lime their arable land so repeatedly, and ye 

 add no organic manure— that lh«y will, sooner or later, cease tp boast of its fertility 



