ECONOMY OF FARMING. 95 



from the time of manuring : therefore they may reflect that no practice exists without 

 theory, and that a correct or a false theory always exhibits itself by a correct or 

 defective practice. Is our view — concerning the different capacity of plants to 

 assimilate organic matters ; concerning the advantages of clover and luzerne roots ; 

 of the necessity of replacing to the grass-kind of grain fruit all that they have pro- 

 duced, &c — correct ? this is of the greatest importance for the practice of Agriculture, 

 as we have had occasion to show in the sixth paragraph of this note. 



2. WHAT ANIMALS PRODUCE THE NECESSARY MANURE FOR THE MANAGEMENT OP 

 THE FARM AT THE CHEAPEST RATE ? 



1. Those animals will produce the manure required for agriculture at the 

 cheapest rate, which by the value of their labor or their otherwise usefulness 

 repay wholly or in a great measure, the value of the food given them. 



When horses perform so much labor that their food and all that is expended on 

 them is thus repaid ; then the manure which they produce in the stables is a clear 

 profit. If they do not perform so much work that the cost is covered, the value of 

 their manure mustbe reckoned to repair this loss. If through futeningthe fodder as well 

 as the trouble is repaid by the increased value of the cattle ; then the value of the 

 manure is a clear gain in this undertaking. But if oxen, cows, sheep and swine do 

 not by their use repay the value of their feeding ; then we must either reckon their 

 manure to the field far too high to cover these losses, by which we deceive ourselves, 

 or we must enter it as loss sustained on cattle. 



According to Arngeville's estimates, 100 lbs. Vienna weight (about 123 lbs. English) 

 of stall-manure stood him at lO.S kr. (about 7 cts.), as there the value of hay is 

 51 kr. (=: 33 cts. per cwt.), and a cwt. of rich cheese sells for only 20 j florins (= 

 nearly $10). 



2. Manure has for a given place a definite value. As much greater as 

 is the value in the production of fruits from one manuring on one half of the 

 field manured, compared with another which was not manured, will be the 

 value of the manuring. 



According to the cash-value of the plants which one cultivates is the cash-value of 

 the manure. Therefore the gardener can reckon it higher than the farmer. He can 

 reckon it higher who employs it for plants raised for trade, than he can who uses it 

 to raise grain to be consumed on his farm, because the former always sells propor- 

 tionally higher than the latter. Where maize and wheat are the principal products, 

 the value of the manure is higher than where they are rye and oats. Thaer sets 

 down a cart load of stall-manure of 20 Berlin cwt. = 1S72 lbs. Vienna weight (about 

 1 ton English), equal to 1| Berlin schafiel = 1.32 metzen (= 2^ bushels), and if we 

 suppose with Hube (der Landwirth, Vol. II. p. 402), that one half of the product in 

 grain in a not-hitherto neglected farm, must be ascribed to the newly-carried on ma- 

 nure, and the other half to the old humus, and that there was harvested in the first 

 half twice as much as in the last half; then this valuation where peas, rye and oats 

 are the field-fruits, agrees pretty correctly. If indeed the product of 86 metzen of 

 grain-kernels in 6 years, mentioned in the first volume, p. 181 of this Manual, is re- 

 duced to rye, it amounts to 74.5 metzen (= 126 bushels), for wdiich was employed 46 

 cwt. of manure. Upon a similar, but not manured extent of the same field, it bore 

 37.25 metzen (=: 63 bushels), consequently the surplus product of 37.25 metzen is 

 equal to 496 cwt. of manure, or 1872 lbs. of manure are equal to 1.49 metzen of rye 

 (= 2^ bushels). But it is more than probable that the unmanured half would not 

 produce so much, and that therefore the manure would have a higher value. 



The true value is known by very few farmers ; most of them have only obscure 

 and confused ideas on the subject, and so neglect the requisite production and gath- 

 ering of the same. Nothing therefore would more raise to a proper footing the cul- 

 tivation of fodder and the rearing of cattle, and by means of this the cultivation of 

 grain and plants for trade, than the ascertaining the proportional value of manure 

 to the staple product of a country, in given circumstances, by a course of experiments 

 for many years ; and no subject deserves more to be investigated in experimental 

 farms than this ; because it is too costly for others on account of the loss which they 

 suffer in the unmanured half of the field. 



How tlie product of the field increases with the increase of manure, and a propor- 



