100 HOW TO GROW GOOD GRASSES. 



Now, as regards very wet meadows, it is found 

 that they are seldom if ever manured ; for, just as 

 I was told as regards some of the low lands on the 

 banks of the Yeo, in Somersetshire, that it did not 

 pay to manure them; so one might easily imagine 

 that where the land is full of water, and perhaps of 

 moist humus, manure would not tend to the increase 

 of good grass, though it might to that of thistles 

 and buttercups. 



Meadows that are sufficiently sound to yield 

 tolerable hay are too much worked to this end, and 

 are, we think, getting poorer. The Cheshire pastures 

 offer a good example of the effects of greed in this 

 matter. A century ago we feel sure its grass-pro- 

 ducing powers were far beyond what they are now. 

 Grass is gone in hay and bones and cheese, but 

 for generations the farmer has gone on depasturing 

 to make manure ; but as it will be seen, on reflection, 

 that cattle can only deposit as manure, matter which 

 they have taken from the field and converted into 

 manurial substance, they cannot add any new ma- 

 terial : so then this method of restoration must fail 

 at last. Another restoration employed in this county 

 was that of using their salt as a top-dressing. This, 

 as it killed all the coarse grass, and so converted it 

 into manure, recovered the pasture, by, out of bad 

 and rough grass, growing good ones ; but this too 

 would fail in time. Hay, the framework of growing 

 cattle, and cheese, have gone on converting the 

 phosphates and the bone matter of the soil into their 

 substances, and it is now found that returning this 

 in the shape of bones and superphosphates is rapidly 

 effecting an improvement. 



Hence, then, we would recommend less of greed in 



