38 MANURES. 



both corn and grass lands; but the most valuable are those ob- 

 tained from the lowest stratum of the material, where the fibres 

 and roots are thickly set and mostly decayed. This yields a 

 large quantity of very strong ashes. 



Sea-weed is another vegetable manure that may be used with 

 the greatest profit, where the situation of the farmer gives him 

 access to this material. The best mode of applying sea-weeds 

 is to cut them in their most succulent state, and immediately 

 plough them in. 



River or pond-weeds are capable of a similar application, 

 and with great benefit, on loose sandy soils intended for beets, 

 turnips, &c.; though it is to be observed, that such weeds have 

 no effect whatever on wet springy lands, or on those which are 

 liable to be inundated. The proportion is twelve or fourteen 

 cart loads to the acre. 



Rape or cole-seed cake, reduced to a coarse powder, (in ex- 

 tracting the rape-seed oil,) is used with great success as a ma- 

 nure in England, and on the continent of Europe. It contains 

 a large quantity of mucilage, some albuminous matter, and a 

 small quantity of oil. The manure should be recent, arid kept 

 as dry as possible before it is applied. It forms an excellent 

 dressing for turnip crops, and is most economically applied by 

 depositing it in the soil at the same time with the seed. It is 

 highly esteemed as a top dressing for grass lands. It is also 

 employed in England for the feeding and fattening of animals, 

 for which purpose it is very highly esteemed. 



Malt-dust^ or the refuse which is screened from malt in 

 drying, affords, on account of its saccharine matters, an excel- 

 lent vegetable manure for grass lands, in the proportion of from 

 forty to sixty bushels to the acre. It is best calculated for cold 

 clays, or stiff loamy soils, but not those inclined to gravel. It 

 should be applied as dry as possible, and all fermentation pre- 

 vented. 



The seeds of the cotton-plant have been, recently, in some 

 portions of the southern states, applied to the manuring of land, 

 and found to be among the most fertilizing of this class of sub- 

 stances. 



Linseed-cake, though an excellent article, is too valuable as 

 a food for cattle to be much employed as a manure. The water 

 in which flax and hemp are steeped for the purpose of obtain- 

 ing the pure vegetable fibre, has considerable fertilizing powers. 

 It contains much vegetable extractive matter, and putrefies 

 readily; it should be applied as soon as the vegetable fibre is 

 removed. 



Of excrementiiious animal matter, applied in its unmixed 

 state, one of the most useful is night-soil, a substance which is 





