IS 



AMERICAN MANURES. 



This saying is very good as far as it goes, but it 

 seems to be incomplete, and we will make a 

 little addition to it, as follows : " But the man 

 who continually gathers from the soil, and 

 returns nothing to it until he can gather no 

 more, changing a fertile smiling land into a 

 sterile wilderness, impoverishes himself, wrongs 

 his country, and beggars his children." This 

 may seem severe, but it is none the less true. 

 How much individual poverty has been caused 

 by excessive cropping, and a total neglect or 

 an inadequate application of manures ? That 

 this state of things has in a great measure been 

 caused by ignorance w^e will charitably admit, 

 but whatever be the cause of the evil, the effect 

 is the same. 



In this vital principle of true and successful 

 farming, sustaining fertility by sufficient manur- 

 ing, we are as a nation shamefully ignorant and 

 criminally negligent. In this matter many of 

 our farmers seem totally indifferent, either to 

 precept or example ; and the work of deteriora- 

 tion is still going on, unchecked and unheeded 

 in all parts of the country, while the very sub- 

 stances that would prevent and avert this 

 great national evil are allowed to go to waste 

 everywhere. Farmers often permit their stable 

 manure to lie for months exposed to the in- 

 fluence of the weather, thus losing the most 



