348 SOILS 



One of the great functions of manure is to 

 improve the condition of the soil, so that the 

 plant can more readily use the plant food in it. 

 Examine old, dry, cow dung in the pasture. The 

 plant food in it has been mostly washed out; a 

 spongy, fibrous material is left which, when 

 crumbled, presents such equable conditions of 

 moisture and temperature, that florists like to sow 

 cineraria and other extremely fine and delicate 

 seeds upon it. This material, which is about one- 

 quarter of the original substance of manure the 

 balance being water is composed mostly of food 

 that the animal did not digest. When incorpo- 

 rated with the soil it greatly improves the texture, 

 loosening a heavy, compact soil and binding to- 

 gether a light, leachy one; making the soil more 

 friable, warmer, more retentive of moisture and 

 more congenial to plants in every way. 



In three years' experiments, King found that 

 manured fallow ground contained eighteen tons 

 more water per acre in the first foot of soil than 

 similar land unmanured, while the total gain of 

 water in the first three feet of soil was thirty-four 

 tons. Being already fine and partially decayed, 

 the vegetable matter in manure is at once thor- 

 oughly incorporated with the soil, becoming humus; 

 while a green-manuring crop plowed under is con- 

 verted into humus slowly. No one who has seen 

 the almost magical improvement in a hard, clay 

 soil by a single liberal dressing of manure can doubt 

 that its value is largely, sometimes mostly, in its 

 effect upon soil texture. 



The Bacteria in Manure. Aside from the humus 

 it adds, manure benefits the soil in other ways, most 

 of which are still imperfectly understood! It is 

 known that manure contains countless numbers of 



