No. 9. 



More about the Anti-Septic effects of Lime. 



301 



may read, and a wayfaring man cannot err ! 

 And is it not also self-evident, that if these 

 animalculte were created to prey on keallhj/ 

 plants and animals, they would be destructive 

 of the laws of nature, instead of working in 

 unison towards the grand fulfilment of tiie 

 whole design — exercising demoniacal power 

 in the material, as the evil one is supposed 

 to be doing in tlie moral world, on a principle 

 adverse to the Creator, whose law is, "in- 

 crease and multiply and replenish." 



With this view of the subject, I can fully 

 understand and appreciate the consummate 

 wisdom which has so beautifully ordained the 

 system with which we are surrounded, for I 

 eee that the moment the decay of the least 

 animal or vegetable matter takes place, and 

 when it would be no longer either useful or 

 ornamental, immediately " mouths are found 

 ready to convert the putrid mass" — which 

 would else remain to exhale into the atmo- 

 sphere, unfitting it for healthful respiration — 

 »' into food for living things;" each perform- 

 ing the office of the Turkey-Buz.zard amongst 

 animals, and clearing away what is become 

 offensive and deleterious. And more than 

 this, it would be perfectly unnatural and 

 therefore impossible, in the wise economy, 

 for the lives of these animalculte to be sup- 

 ported by the juices of any but diseased plants 

 and animals; hence it is, that we see, as has 

 elsewhere been observed, that after a plant 

 has become covered with living animalculse, 

 in consequence of the stagnation and putri- 

 city of its juices, a fine sunny day or two, or 

 even a single genial shower of rain, will have 

 the effect of bringing back a natural state of 

 circulation, when immediately, and as if by 

 magic, the whole brood of living things will 

 be swept away — their presence being no 

 longer necessary — without the least inter- 

 vention of human power, no one knowing 

 which way they go or what becomes of them ! 

 I repeat, therefore, that the theory advocated 

 by Agricola appears to me so simple, self-evi- 

 dent, and satisfactory, that I must be permit- 

 ted to wonder that all are not struck with the 

 power of its truth. J. Delgrade. 



Luzerne County. 



"I ALWAYS listen to the remarks of coun- 

 try people on the habits of animals ; one of 

 these being shown Gainsborough's celebrated 

 painting of pigs feeding, ' To be sure,' said 

 he, 'they be deadly like pigs, but nobody ne- 

 ver seed three pigs feeding together, but one 

 one 'em had a foot in the trough.' " 



In Persia, where the pigeon is not eaten, 

 they are kept merely for the sake of their 

 dung, which is used exclusively for raising 

 watermelons ; some nobles keep as many as 

 10,000 for this purpose only. 



For the Farmers' Cabinet. 



3Iore about the Anti-Septic effects of 

 Lime. 



Mr. Editor, — In tiie last number of the 

 Cabinet, over the signature of Aralor, is an 

 essay headed " Lime a Septic," from which 

 I understand the writer to allege that lime 

 promotes and hastens the putrelactive fermen- 

 tation, or decomposition, of animal and vege- 

 table substances, or, in agricultural language, 

 tiiat it promotes the decay or rotting of those 

 substances, and hastens their conversion into 

 mould. The example adduced to prove this 

 position is as follows, viz: 



"I set to work to operate upon a pile of 

 cliips at my door, which, in tiie course of 

 years, had accumulated to a very inconveni- 

 ent bulk. These were thrown up in the form 

 of a stack, with an admixture of quick-lime; 

 in the course of two weeks a violent fermen- 

 tation had commenced throughout the mass, 

 by which it was reduced in six months to less 

 than one-third of its original dimensions, hav- 

 ing the appearance of fine vegetable mould, 

 and proving a most efficacious top-dressing to 

 a piece of unproductive meadow. Its (that 

 is lime) agency in promoting the decomposi- 

 tion of that mass of straw and stable litter, 

 with which our barn-yards are encumbered 

 in the spring, is well known to our farmers, 

 and is otlen used for that purpose." 



A Montgomery county farmer, who is fa- 

 miliar with the application of lime on a large 

 scale, and observant of its effects, and one of 

 your constant readers, in speaking of the 

 above, gave it as his opinion, that they were 

 made facts to support a theory that practical 

 farmers had long since rejected as untenable. 

 He says, by the occasional application of 

 quick-lime to chips as it is washed off" by 

 rains, (say once a year,) they may be pre- 

 served, for an indefinite period, as sound as 

 when it was first applied to them. It being 

 premised that the quantity of lime is not such 

 as to promote combustion, or the "■destructive 

 decomposition," as it is som.etimes called. As 

 regards "straw and stable litter," and he 

 might have added cornstalks, every farmer 

 who has applied lime to these substances, (so 

 as not to burn them to ashes,) knows that they 

 are preserved from decay in a remarkable 

 manner by it, and are found for months after 

 of a beautiful yellow colour. 



As experimenters sometimes disagree in 

 regard to results, I propose to Arator to begin 

 anew, by taking two cart-loads of fresh chips, 

 one of which shall be deposited in " a stack," 

 without any intermixture whatever, exposed 

 to the inffuence of the elements; the other 

 shall be similarly disposed near the first, every 

 circumstance corresponding exactly, except- 

 ing that the latter shall be mixed, and well 

 covered, and kept covered, with " quick " or 



