218 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



with a little quicklime, is quickly converted into the most 

 enriching manure. 



Can muck be used on land to advantage without being com- 

 posted ? This is a question frequently asked. We answer, 

 generally not. On sandy, light and porous soils it certainly 

 gives, by its quality of attracting and retaining moisture, a 

 better consistency to the soil, and renders stiff, clayey soils 

 looser and more friable. We have also noticed that it has a 

 strong tendency to bring in clover on grass lands. 



It affords too the best possible mulch to trees, shrubs and 

 ornamental vines, though there is danger of forcing too great a 

 growth of wood, when used too freely around fruit trees. We 

 have long admired its effect upon trees, but were recently 

 astonished, on removing part of a large heap which was brought 

 from the basin of the new reservoirs at Chestnut Hill, and de- 

 posited two years since under some old apple-trees, to find new 

 and vigorous roots thrown out from their trunks and extending 

 through the heap in every direction. 



Our muck swamps of varying quality and depth are then of 

 immense value to the agriculture of Massachusetts. 



In our recent visit to the Island of Nantucket, as delegate 

 from this Board to that Society's exhibition, we were greatly 

 impressed with the vast deposits of peat on that island. There 

 seems to be no possibility of owning a farm, even the smallest, 

 without having within its bounds the muck for converting the 

 sandy soil into the finest of meadow. Farmers are there too 

 who appreciate its value, if one may judge from the great use 

 made of it by our associate, Mr. Thompson, though we fear 

 others (not all,) are slow to follow his excellent example. No 

 experiments within our knowledge have been better carried out, 

 and none in their results are more convincing as to the great 

 and wondrous transformation to be effected on sandy soil by 

 the free, judicious use of muck. 



For ourselves, we should deem it about as wise to abandon 

 the labor-saving machines as to give up the use of muck. 



Leverett Saltonstall, for the Committee. 



This Essay was laid over under the rule, when it was 

 Voted^ That the time of holding the Fair of the Middlesex 



