USE OF MANURES. 443 



facts to start with ; and if we keep them in mind wc cannot go 

 very wrong in practice. For example : few, if any, will deny the 

 superiority of barn-yard manure over all others as a means of 

 fertilization; and the reason seems to be obvious enough, since 

 it returns to the soil more nearly than any other all the prin- 

 ciples withdrawn from it, in the best condition to insure re- 

 production. But, where the soil has become impoverished from 

 neglecting this obvious truth, something more may be needed 

 to restore it to a remunerative degree of fertility beyond what 

 our barn yard can supply — in which event we must resort to 

 foreign and artificial manures. 



In a case of this nature there is a very safe rule of practice 

 which may always be followed. In the first place we must as- 

 certain from the best received authorities, unless our own ex- 

 perience has taught us, the relative value of the special fertili- 

 zer which we propose to make use of compared with barn- 

 yard manure, and the number of tons of the latter which should 

 be applied to the acre. Having ascertained the extent of our 

 deficiency, if wc compost with what we have so much of the 

 special fertilizer as will make it equal to a full supply of barn- 

 yard manure, and apply them together, we shall derive the full 

 benefit of both. There is something quite consonant to reason 

 in the composting together all the fertilizing ingredients at our 

 command. We know that plants require many kinds of food 

 for their perfect growth and development, some undoubtedly 

 taking more of one than another. If, however, in the cultiva- 

 tion of one kind, some of the fertilizers thus composted are not 



It does not follow that they are lost; thi In in- 



corporated with the soil, ready at a future period to yield their 

 food each to its appropriate plant. If wc cultivate, therefore, 

 in a proper rotation, then all that wc deposit in the soil under 

 the general term manure will be ultimately developed and re- 

 store! to as in succeeding crops. 



The unexampled drought of this season will not have been 

 without its advantage if we act upon the lesson it has taught 

 every observant farmer upon this point. Those crops the ma- 

 turity of which was hastened by good culture and high manur- 



red but little, while those which received only common 

 attention were very seriously diminished. Two or three addi- 



