Farm Horses. 135 



ft is scattered about the pastures, and nine-tenths of it 

 carried away by the flies, or dried almost to a caput 

 mortuum by the sun. The prodigious superiority of thus 

 raising a large and very valuable dunghill in one case, and 

 none at all in the other, ought to convince any reasonable 

 man that there is not a practice in husbandry so decidedly 

 superior as this of soiling, were there not one other reason 

 for it than what have already been produced. 



Those farmers who have given particular attention to 

 the state of farmyard manure, as it is made in winter and 

 in summer, and to the efficacy of both, can scarcely have 

 filled to remark that the superiority of the dung arising 

 from any sort of stock in summer is very great to such as 

 is made in winter from stock no better fed. 



There is, however, another fact of equal importance, 

 that the food given in stalls or boxes goes so much 

 farther than it will do when grazed where it grows ; and 

 when we recollect the old remark, that a beast feeds (or 

 consumes) with five mouths, we shall not be surprised at 

 this fact. A greater stock may thus be supported by the 

 same farm, in one system, than there can be in the 

 other. 



Two circumstances demand attention, which, if neglected, 

 will considerably lessen the benefit to be derived from 

 soiling. The one is, to have a plentiful provision of litter ; 

 and the other, much care in feeding to give the beasts 

 but little at a time : if much be tumbled before them, it 

 heats, they pick it over, and the waste may be great ; and 

 if a cart be left in the yard loaded, the contents heat, and 

 then the animals will not eat it. A certain degree of care 

 is necessary in everything, and in nothing more than in 

 feeding. As to litter, it is an object of such importance, 

 that provision for the system should be gradually made 

 through the winter, if corn enough be not left for summer 

 threshing to supply the beasts. All dry vegetable matter, 

 capable of providing a dry lair in stalls or boxes ; leaves, 

 in woodland countries ; fern, dried peat, &c., should be 

 thus collected against the summer months. An enter- 

 prising, vigilant farmer, when he has such an object as 

 this in view, will exert every nerve to be prepared for a 



