532 AGRICULTURE. 



The limits of the present chapter are such that it must be 

 suggestive only. It advances no pretension to be either learned 

 or exhaustive. The design is to present an outline sketch of a 

 scientific system of fertilization, the details of which will vary 

 with circumstances, but always answering to the demands of 

 science, by making restitution to the soil of the elements of fer- 

 tility deposited in the crops. 



The economical saving and application of farm-yard manure 

 demands methodical and judicious practice. Extravagance and 

 neglect are the two extremes of wastefulness. Having expen- 

 sive buildings and arrangements, the interest on the cost of 

 which, and the expense for repairs of which, exceed the annual 

 value of all the manure saved, resembles the policy of saving at 

 the spile and losing at the bung. Allowing valuable manure to 

 be leached out, and washed away, and then hauling out the 

 mere carbonaceous residue, may be likened to a cask which 

 leaks at both spile and bung, and the contents of which run 

 wholly to waste. Farm-yard manure accumulating in well lit- 

 tered yards during winter, suffers very little loss from leach- 

 ing, because the fermentation is not very active and it is by 

 means of this process that the valuable constituents are ren- 

 dered soluble ; but the manure must be gotten out early in the 

 spring, for as the temperature rises the fermentation is hastened, 

 and the loss will, in a short time, be very great. 



The plan of allowing the manure to accumulate in stalls under 

 the animals all winter, and keeping the stalls well littered so as 

 to cover up the manure as fast as formed, and keep the animals 

 clean, is to be condemned as doing violence to hygienic law, and 

 not saving labor. The arrangement of the manure is largely a 

 matter of judicious common sense. I have kept it in pens of 

 stout poles or logs, about 8 feet by 1 8 or 20 feet, and about 3 feet 

 high, mounding it over above the top of the pen, and by this 

 plan have not found it to "fire-fang" ; whereas, it is sufficiently 

 rotted to be applied early in spring. There is no doubt that 

 the plan of chaffing the roughness of the farm and steaming it 

 with meal, or cake, or bran, or a mixture of all, and also using 

 chaffed fodfcr for litter and bedding, is a great advantage to 

 the manure ; for not only does the steaming destroy fungi and 

 larvae, and eggs of destructive insects, but the manure is sooner 



