MAY.] -I LING. ;J17 



Those farmers who have given particular atten- 

 tion to the state of farm-yard manure, as it is made 

 in winter and in summer, and to the efficacy of both, 

 can scarcely have failed to remark, that the supe- 

 riority of the dung arising from any sort of stock, 

 commonly fed, in summer, is very great to such as 

 is made in winter from stock no hetter fed. The 

 manure yielded hy fat hogs, and by fat beasts fed 

 on oil-cake, is of such a quality, that the season 

 does not demand attention ; but with all other 

 stock I have great reason to believe, from many 

 observations, that a farmer should make as large a 

 reserve of straw-stubble, &c. for littering in sum- 

 mer, as possible. 



Cattle, when soiled upon any kind of green food, 

 as tares, clover, chicory, lucerne, or grass, make 

 so large a quantity of urine as to demand the 

 greatest quantity of litter : the degree of this 

 moisture in which their litter is kept, while the 

 weather is hot, much assists a rapid fermentation, 

 and great quantities of carbonic acid and hydrogen 

 are generated. The winter's cold, with superfluous 

 water, by rain or snow, has a contrary tendency : 

 the manure is, comparatively speaking, weak and 

 poor. 



When I view the common spectacle of a large 

 yard spread with a thin stratum of straw or stubble, 

 and a parcel of lean straw -fed cows wandering 

 about it, I think I see the most ingenious way of 

 annihilating litter, without making dung, that the 

 wit of man could have invented. Burning such 



straw 



