8 FERTILIZERS. 



oceans of verdure thousands of years before the human 

 era. Enter the limitless woods, and ask the giant pines 

 for the secret of their towering robustness. Was it barn 

 manure ? 



Says Bruckner, " Farmers, accustomed to think of ma- 

 nure as a bulky article, want bulk for their money. They 

 ar.e slow to realize that a little of the substance needed is 

 better than a good deal that is not needed." 



I will say, at the outset, that this little treatise is not 

 designed to be a tilt against barnyard manure : that will 

 always have its place in agriculture, as I find, myself, in 

 the great quantities I use annually in my own farming 

 operations. But I would like to see the circulars of some 

 of the dealers in fertilizers take a little bolder stand, and 

 not say, that, after we have used all our barn manure, then 

 comes the time to buy fertilizers, but to declare that there 

 are crops which can be raised decidedly cheaper on fertil- 

 izers, besides ripening earlier (as corn), and being of 

 better quality (as potatoes), and that it would always be 

 decidedly better to use a part or all of fertilizers on such 

 crops, and give what manure we have remaining to the 

 acres of grass-lands that would be fertilized by it on every 

 farm. I contend for a broad handling of this subject of 

 plant-food, and a recognition of the true value of it in , 

 every form in which it exists. 



WHAT IS BARNYARD MANURE? 



I took a little of it, fresh from the horse-stall, and dried 

 all the water out of it on the hearth, and was surprised at 

 the result. On breaking it up fine, all I could find, by the 

 closest scrutiny with the naked eye, was a mass of bits of 

 hay, ranging from a third of an inch long to so small as to 

 be barely visible j and I will defy any one with the naked 

 eye to find any thing else. Many of the fragments of the 



