100 On tJie Uses of Salt in Agriculture. 



time before the land is ploughed. The salt being thoroughly incor- 

 porated with the soil, during the spring and summer following, the 

 strength of the salt would be so much reduced, when the seed is sown, 

 that instead of injuring, it will promote vegetation ; and the lands, it 

 is said, will be found to produce a crop, superior to those under any 

 other mode of cultivation, the advantage of which will be experienced 

 for several succeeding years *. 



It would be extremely important, to compare the produce and ex- 

 pense of a fallow, treated in this manner, or manured with lime. 



Salt has likewise been advantageously applied to crops. R. Le- 

 grand, Esq. tried it twice on a barley tilth, sowing the salt at the rate 

 of sixteen bushels per acre, immediately after the crop was covered 

 by the harrow. The verdure in spring, owing in part perhaps, to its 

 producing moisture, exceeded any thing he had ever seen, and the 

 ripened appearance was whiter, by many shades, than he had ever be- 

 held -j-. Mr Hollinshead also, recommends sowing sixteen bushels of 

 salt per acre, on a crop of potatoes, as soon as they are covered with 

 earth ; and he maintains, that by the adoption of that system, alter- 

 nate crops of wheat and potatoes, might be permanently produced on 

 the same soil J. These are modes of application, however, the utility 

 of which ought to be tried by repeated experiments, before they can 

 be confidently relied on. 



It has been proved by Pringle and Macbride, that though salt 

 will, in large quantities, prevent putrefaction, owing to its antiseptic- 

 properties, yet that it has an evident tendency to promote the pro- 

 cess, when used in small quantities. Hence the advantage of mix- 

 ing it in moderate quantities with farm-yard dung , and other animal 

 and vegetable substances. 



An experiment was tried in Cheshire, of mixing grass roots, and 

 other rubbish harrowed off the land, with foul salt ; it was then in- 

 corporated with other manures, and the effects of this compost, on a 

 crop of barley and grass seeds, is said greatly to have exceeded the 

 most sanguine expectations that had been formed of it ||. 



Salt, when applied in composts, is said to have been found a more 

 beneficial manure even than lime. A farmer mixed up a quantity of 

 refuse salt, with the earth taken out of water furrows, and another 

 portion of the same earth with lime. Of the two, the vegetation of 

 that part of the field, which had the salt compost laid upon it, was by 

 far the healthiest and most vigorous ^[. 



In those parts of Cornwall, where the pilchard fisheries prevail, 

 considerable quantities of old or condemned salt **, are used as a ma- 



* Hollinshead on the Importance of Salt as a Manure, second edition, p. 17. 

 It is said that Mr Hollinshead devoted above twenty years of his life, to a scien- 

 tific and practical inquiry into the uses of salt as a manure. Sir Thomas Ber- 

 nard s Tract on Salt, p. 279. 



f Hollinshead, 2d edit. p. 12. f Ditto, p. 19. 



It may be advantageously strewed over farm-yard dung, when carried to 

 the field. 



D Cheshire Report, p. 237. ^ Ditto, p. 237. 



Sir Humphry Davy (Lectures, 4 to edit, p. 295), states, that refuse salt, 



