MANURES. 135 



not one in the forty-nine returned an answer in the 

 negative. Their use was rapidly increasing. 



Upon grass, either for meadow or pasture, their 

 effect was favourable, the herbage being improved 

 in quality and quantity. Six hundred bushels were 

 spread upon twenty-four acres of a dairy-farm, of 

 dry, sandy gravel, which had been laid down ten 

 years. The effect was to produce double the butter 

 from the cows depastured upon it to those which 

 were fed upon like pasture not boned. 



The general application of bone-dust in England 

 is to the turnip-crop, one of the most important in 

 British husbandry ; and the opinions as to the best 

 mode of applying it, whether in drills $ or broadcast, 

 are various, though the former opinio'n rather pre- 

 vails. 



As to the size of the bones, the opinion is in fa- 

 vour of half-inch bones. Mr. Burk says, " If I were 

 to till for early profit, I would use bones powdered 

 as small as sawdust : if I wished to keep my land in 

 good heart, I would use principally half-inch bones, 

 and in breaking these I should prefer some consid- 

 erably larger." " By using bones of a large size, 

 with dust in them," says another correspondent, " I 

 think I have sufficient of the small particles to set 

 the crop forward, and sufficient of the large particles 

 left to maintain the land in good" condition for the 

 last crop" in the course. 



In regard to the quantity to be applied to an acre, 

 although the committee admit that the average of 

 the returns is thirty-nine bushels, they neverthe- 

 less recommend, as a sufficient dressing, twenty- 

 five bushels of the small size and forty bushels of 

 the half-inch, giving to the poorer lands a greater, 

 and to the richer a smaller quantity. 



Some of the correspondents prefer raw or fresh 

 bones, and some those which have been boiled, and 

 the glue and oil extracted. 



Without going into farther detail, we shall close 



