10 A PRACTICAL TREATISE 



the dung", even of those wliich are supported entirely on veg'e- 

 tables, partakes more of an animal than of a vef^etabie nature. 

 The food on which they are supported, and their state of flesh, 

 also make an essential difference in tlie quality of the manure. 

 If the stomach of an animal be filled with provision which con- 

 tains but little nutriment, and which is composed of fibrous 

 matter which it is difficult to decompose — for instance, straw 

 alone, without grain — this will pass through the intestines in 

 almost the same state as it was eaten. The dung will contain 

 less of that secretion which belongs to animals whose flesh has 

 not been deprived of its nourishing' juices; though even this 

 small quantity serves to give the straw a stimulus to putre- 

 faction. But the excrement of animals which have been sup- 

 ported upon nutritive food — as corn and pulse, or the oleaginous 

 seeds of rape and linseed, though given in the shape of cake — 

 and which are thus maintained in high condition, imbibes much 

 of that property to which we have alluded, which tiiereby 

 yields a more fertilizing manure than that furnished by lean 

 stock. This, indeed, is strikingly exemplified by the difierence 

 observable in that produced by stall-fed cattle, and those kept 

 in the straw yard ; and there can be no doubt that the fatter 

 the animal, the richer will be its dung.* 



It has been thought that the dung of ruminant animals — 

 oxen and sheep — when pastured, is preferable to that of horses, 

 also kept at grass, which is supposed to be owing to the greater 

 quantity of animal juices secreted with their food in tlie act of 

 chewing ; but the fact requires to be established by a more 

 minute and critical analysis of its properties. All animal 

 manure, however, partakes in its fertilizing properties of the 

 richness of the food by which it has been created ; yet expe- 

 rience proves that its immediate powers are in several in- 

 stances widely different. Thus the ordure of a man and that 

 of a dog, though fed upon tlie same food, is so wholly distinct 

 in its effects, that the excrement of the latter is used instead 

 of bark in the process of tanning goat-skins for the production 

 of morocco leather. Pigeon's dung, too, is hotter than that 

 of other fowls, j though both are fed alike ; and it is said that 



*lt is stated in the Norfolk Report, that 10 loads of dun? from cattle fed 

 upon oil-cuke, have been found to answer as well as 16 from beasts fed 

 upon turnips.— p. '120. 



t By an experiment stated in the Agricultural Magazino, it was found that 

 the dung of hens was more etR-ctual than that of ducks ; while that of 

 geese was scarcely perceptible aa manure. 



