624 SELECTIONS FROM ADDRESSES. 



This is often a good test to know if yonr guano has been 

 properly ploughed in ; go over the land with such a stick, and 

 observe if it produces fumes anywhere. For Indian corn, for 

 wheat, rye and other cereals, for grass, for potatoes, and, above 

 all, for turnips, guano is a most excellent manure, and, with an 

 outlay of ^8 per acre, all charges included, will give as large, 

 and a more nutritious crop than any other manure, and will 

 amply repay the expense. Permanently therefore to improve 

 light lands, I strongly advise a course of three or four years' 

 action with guano, and during this period a careful accumula- 

 tion and consolidation of manure, to be then put on to the land 

 in large quantities at a time, but always to keep on hand a 

 back stock for future use, and never to apply it until three, four 

 or more years old. 



I am entitled to give this advice, as I have used guano alone 

 on a miserable soil for six consecutive years, and have had 

 at least as good crops as those who have used barnyard ma- 

 nure. I have a letter from England dated 19th September, 

 from a gentleman whose position enables him to possess inti- 

 mate knowledge on this subject, in which, after noticing the 

 arrival of cargoes of guano from Shark's island, Australia, and 

 Seychelles islands in the China sea, and giving me the relative 

 values compared with the Peruvian, he observes ; " Guano is 

 quite established here now, and farmers know for certain that 

 it doubles their profits." And with respect to the manner of 

 storing manure, others may probably adopt better ways ; my 

 chief desire has been to point out the principles, leaving the 

 practice to more experienced hands. 



It is not to be expected that men who like myself have 

 passed much time in cities, should be acquainted with all the 

 practical details of the agricultural profession ; but this I may 

 with certainty affirm, that of those points of husbandry to 

 which I have paid any attention there is not a single one, but 

 what may be considered as susceptible of very great improve- 

 ment by the application of the powers of the cultivated mind, 

 and it is the want of practical faith in this assertion which has 

 hitherto been the greatest bar to the dissemination of more 

 knowledge on agriculture by education ; as if agriculture could 



