16 



E&8AY 



stable or yard manure, be returned to the land, it "will 

 be nearly as valuable as if the original hay had remained 

 and decayed on the land where it grew. Its bulk is 

 unchanged, but the quality is just so far reduced as the 

 animal has appropriated its nutritious constituents in 

 adding to its structure, or in the production of fat or 

 milk. In addition to this manure, a considerable pro- 

 portion of that part of the food which goes to supply 

 waste is eventually given off in the liquid excretion of 

 the animal, and this liquid, when used in connexion 

 with the solid, is found to have a pecuniary value equal 

 to or even exceeding it. It does not form humus in the 

 course of its decomposition, but it produces ammonia, 

 and this alkali combining with the humus of the solid 

 manure renders it soluble, and as a consequence at 

 once available. 



It is the experience of every careful and observing 

 farmer, that, if the manurial product of an acre of grass 

 be all saved and returned to the same acre, the produc- 

 tive power of the land will be increased thereby. It 

 will be readily seen that this must be so, else every 

 cultivated farm would long since have become barren 

 or rather, it would never have been otherwise. Were 

 it not a wise provision of nature that vegetation takes 

 from the soil in the course of its formation much less 

 humus than its decay will furnish, this earth would 

 have been forever a barren waste, without a green or 

 living thing upon its face. 



This survey of the subject seems to open up to our 

 view the principal source from which success is attain- 

 able in the pursuit of agriculture. If we carefully save 

 all the vegetable matter of our lands, and return it to 



