MANURES. 163 



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the water of all ordinary rains, and liold it, till in fair 

 weather it has time to evaporate, instead of running 

 off and carrying the best of the manure with it. The 

 benefit of its evaporation is, that when it evaporates, 

 it goes off into the air, as pure water, or nearly so, 

 leaving the salts dissolved in it behind ; whereas, if 

 it sinks through into the ground, it carries these salts 

 away with it. It makes a great difference with the 

 manure, whether the rain-water of a whole summer 

 has left it by evaporation^ or by leaching. In the latter 

 case, it is full of active salts ; in the former, its best 

 salts, the potash and soda especially, which are easily 

 dissolved, have been washed out of it. 



305. Some practise ploughing over the contents of 

 the yard once or twice a month during the summer. 

 It is a much better practice to add to it as often a few 

 loads of new material, enough at least to keep the 

 thickness good or a little increasing, as the cows and 

 other animals tread it down. Supposing the yard, in- 

 cluding the portions under cover, to contain 20 square 

 rods, which is none too large for a yard on a consider- 

 able farm, the solid manure, at 6 inches in depth, 

 would give bQ large loads, of 50 cubic feet each ; and 

 every load would be worth more than the 3 or 4 or 

 half dozen loads of dry, scaly stuff, that would have 

 accumulated from the mere excrements of the ani- 

 mals, during the summer. 



306. According to the practice of some, this should 

 be carried out in the fall. I would by no means ad- 

 vise to such a course, unless you mean to put in as 



