ANIMAL AND VEGETABLE MANURES. 71 



as two bushels of bone-dust, or crushed bones, properly 

 applied, will, upon some soils, do as much good as a load 

 of barn-yard manure ; portable, because they may be 

 transported at one tenth the expense of their equivalent 

 of yard-dung. Bone-dust is comparatively a new ma- 

 nure, at least in the United States, though it has been 

 long highly prized, and extensively used, in Great Brit- 

 ain. Such have been its magic effects in British hus- 

 bandry, and such the increasing demand for it there, that 

 bones to the value of more than $800,000, it is said, are 

 annually imported into that country, to enrich the soil, in 

 addition to those which the kingdom furnishes ; and it is 

 announced in one of her late agricultural periodicals, that 

 the use of this manure is actually adding sixteen millions 

 of bushels of grain annually to her agricultural products. 

 This great source of fertility is now engaging the atten- 

 tion of the American farmer, and some mills have been 

 put in operation near Boston, New York, Albany, Wa- 

 terford, &c., and there is no doubt but the use of this 

 fertilizing material will be rapidly and profitably ex- 

 tended. We shall speak further of its importance, and 

 the modes of applying it, in a chapter appropriated to 

 this subject. 



2. Horn-shavings, These consist of the chips and 

 refuse of the horns and hoofs of neat cattle, from comb- 

 factories. Although more limited in quantity than the 

 bones of animals, they may be had in considerable amount, 

 and are equal, and, according to Davy, superior, to 

 crushed bones, in their fertilizing influence upon the soil. 

 From 500 grains of ox-horn Mr. Hatchet obtained only 

 1.5 grains of residuum, and not quite half of this was 

 phosphate of lime — the residue being decomposable ani- 

 mal matter. " The animal matter in them," says Davy, 

 " seems to be of the nature of coagulated albumen, and 

 it is slowly rendered soluble by the action of water. The 

 earthy matter in horn, and still more that in bones, pre- 

 vents the too rapid decomposition of the animal matter, 

 and renders it very durable in its effects." — *^g. Chem. 

 With these maybe classed the piths of horns, or the resi- 

 due of cattle's horns after the comb-maker has taken all 



