APPENDIX. 333 



loss of weight, I think, would not be very great, nor the bulk lessened 

 over one-half. 



Many years ago an old and successful farmer said to me, " if you want 

 to get the full benefit of manure, spread it as a top-dressing on some 

 growing crop," and all my experience and observation since tend to con- 

 firm the correctness of his advice. 



While on this subject, allow me to protest against the practice of 

 naming the quantity of manure applied to a given space, as so many 

 loads, as altogether too indefinite. The bushel or cord is a definite quan- 

 tity, which all can understand. 



The average price of good livery stable horse-manure at this place has I 

 been for several years four dollars a cord. 



With two and a half miles to haul, I am trying whether keeping a flock 

 of 50 breeding ewes, and feeding liberally with wheat bran, in addition 

 to hay and pasture, will not produce the needed manure more cheaply. 

 Respectfully yours, EDWARD JESSOP. 



P. S. You ask for the average weight of a cord of manure, such as we 

 pay four dollars for. 



I had a cord of horse-stable manure from a livery stable in York which 

 had been all the time under cover, with several pigs running upon it, 

 and was moist, without any excess of wet, loaded into a wagon-box 

 holding an entire cord, or 123 cubic feet, tramped by the wagoner three 

 times while loading. 



The wagon was weighed at our hay-scales before loading, and then the 

 wagon and load together, with a net result for the manure of 4,400 Ibs. 

 I considered this manure rather better than the average. I had another 

 load, from a different place, which weighed over 5,000 Ibs., but on ex- 

 amination it was found to contain a good deal of coal ashes. We never 

 buy by the ton. Harrison Bros. & Co., Manufacturing Chemists, Phila- 

 delphia, rate barnyard-manure as worth $5.77 per ton, and say that would 

 be about $7.21 per cord, which would be less than li tons to the cord. 

 If thrown in loosely, and it happened to be very dry, that might be pos- 

 sible. 



Waring, in his " Handy Book of Husbandry," page 201, says, ha caused 

 a cord of well-trodden livery stable manure containing the usual pro- 

 portion of straw, to be carefully weighed, and that the cord weighed 

 7,080 Ibs. 



The load 1 had weighed, weighing 4,400 Ibs., was considered by the 

 wagoner and by myself as a fair sample of good manure. In view of 

 these wide differences, further trials would be desirable. Dana, in his 

 "Muck Manual," says a cord of green cow-dung, pure, as dropped, 

 weighs 9,289 Ibs. 



Farmers here seldom draw manure with less than three, more generally 

 with four horses or mules ; loading is done by the purchaser. From the 

 barn-yard, put on loose boards, from 40 to 60 bushels are about an aver- 

 age load. 



In hauling from town to a distance of three to five miles, farmers gen- 

 erally make two loads of a cord each, a day's work. From the barn-yard, 



