S88 USE ASD ADVANTAGE OF THE COMPOST KORM. 



Sussex is one of those districts in which the ancient use of marl has 

 given place to the employment of burned lime, (Beatson,)— chiefly, I 

 believe, from the nature of the local marl being less adapted to the stiff 

 clay lands of that county. 



§ 13. Of the use ana advantage of the compost form. 



As there are many cases in which lime ought to be applied unmixed 

 and in the caustic state, so there are others in which it is best and most 

 beneficially laid upon the land in a mild state and in the form of compost. 



1°. When lime is required only in small quantities, it can be more 

 evenly spread when previously well mixed with from 3 to 8 times its 

 bulk of soil. 



2°. On light, sandy, and gravelly soils, when of a dry character, un- 

 mixed lime will bring up much cow-wheat {melampyrum) and red 

 poppy. If they are moist soils, or if rainy weather ensue, the lime is 

 apt to run into mortar, and thus to form either an impervious subsoil, 

 or lumps of a hard conglomerate, which are brought up by the plough, 

 but do not readily yield their lime to the soil. These had consequences 

 are all avoided by adding the lime in the form of compost. 



3°. Applied to grass lands — unless the soil be stiff clay— or much 

 coarse grass is to be extirpated, — it is generally better and safer to apply 

 it in the compost form. The action of the lime on the tender herbage 

 is by this means moderated, and its exhausting effect lessened upon 

 soils which contain little vegetable matter. 



4°. In the compost form the same quantity of lime acts more imme- 

 diately. While lying in a state of mixture, those chemical changes 

 which lime either induces or promotes have already to a certain extent 

 taken place, and thus the sensible effect of the lime becomes apparent 

 in a shorter time after it has been laid upon the land. 



6°. This is still more distinctly the case when, besides earthy mat- 

 ter, decayed vegetable substances, ditch scourings, and other refuse, are 

 mixed with the lime. The experience of every practical man has long 

 proved how very much more enriching such composts are, and more 

 obvious in their effects upon the soil, than the simple application of 

 lime alone. 



6°. It is stated as the result of extended trial in Flanders and in parts 

 of France, that a much smaller quantity of lime laid on in this form 

 will produce an equal effect. For this, one cause may be, that the rains 

 are prevented from acting upon the mass of compost as they would do 

 upon the open soil — in washing out either the lime itself or the saline 

 substances which are produced during its contact with the earthy and 

 vegetable matter with which it is mixed. 



7°. The older the compost the more fertilizing is its action. This 

 fact is of the same kind with that generally admitted in respect to the 

 action of marls and unmixed lime — that it is more sensible in the se- 

 cond year, or in the second rotation, than in the first. 



In conclusion, it may be stated that this form of application is especi- 

 ally adapted to the lightest and driest soils, and to such as are poorest in 

 vegetable matter. In this form, lime has imparted an unexpected fertility 

 even to the white and barren sands of the Landes (Puvis,) and upon 

 the dry hills of Derbyshire it has produced an almost equal benefit. 



