CHAPTER II. 



MANURES AND FERTILISERS. 



THE use and application of manures for the purpose 

 of increasing the fertility and productiveness of the 

 land is an ancient custom, and was known in a gen- 

 eral way to cultivators many centuries ago. Some 

 of the writers who lived before the Christian era have 

 left it on record that in their time various kinds of 

 animal manures were used, and that when manures 

 were scarce men turned in vegetable matter, and 

 ven sowed beans and vetches for digging in as 

 manure. 



Columella, who lived about two thousand years 

 ago, in one of his writings deplores the backward 

 state of cultivation, and tells of the deterioration of 

 soils through neglect, and of the lack of knowledge 

 of the requirements of crops. Virgil, in the Georgics, 

 or Art of Husbandry (37 B.C.), is loud in praise of 

 tares, vetches, pulse, and lupins for their manurial 

 properties, and the enriching effects they have on the 

 soil for the succeeding crops. But although the 

 ancients recognised the value of pod-bearing plants 

 as a preparatory crop, the secret or real cause of 

 their fertilising power is a comparatively recent 



discovery. 



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