L 268 ] 



equal from two to three per cent, of their weight. I 

 have examined these soluble substances procured by 

 solution and evaporation ; they contain a very small 

 quantity of matter analogous to animal mucus ; and 

 are principally composed of a bitter extract, soluble 

 both in water and in alcohol. They give ammoniacal 

 fumes by distillation ; and appear to differ very little 

 in composition. 



I watered some blades of grass for several suc- 

 cessive days with a solution of these extracts ; they 

 evidently became greener in consequence, and grew 

 more vigorously than grass in other respects, under 

 the same circumstances. 



The part of the dung of cattle, sheep, and deer, 

 not soluble in water, appears to be mere woody fibre, 

 and precisely analogous to the residuum of those ve- 

 getables that form their food after they have been de- 

 prived of all their soluble materials. 



The dung of horses gives a brown fluid, which 

 when evaporated, yields a bitter extract, which affords 

 ammoniacal fumes more copiously than that from the 

 dung of oxen. 



If the pure dung of cattle is to be used as manure 

 like the other species of dung which have been men- 

 tioned, there seems no reason why it should be made to 

 ferment except in the soil ; or if suffered to ferment, 

 it sho.uld be only in a very slight degree. The grass 

 in the neighbourhood of recently voided dung, is al- 

 ways coarse and dark green ; some persons have at- 

 tributed this to a noxious quality in unfermented 

 dung ; but it seems to be rather the result of an excess 

 of food furnished to the plants. 



