PRACTICAL AGRICULTURE. 209 



399. Now it is manifest that if he knew the exact 

 deficiencies of his soils and the exact ingredients of 

 these manures, he could appropriate them to the best 

 possible advantage. This, however, he does not know ; 

 and in the present state of knowledge,' he cannot. 

 But it is evident, that if he has been an observing 

 man, he can appropriate them, on the ground of an 

 enlightened judgment, made up bj experience, so that 

 thej will make him twice the return they would if 

 thrown out at random. This last may seem to some 

 extravagant, but it is true nevertheless. Some farmers, 

 for years, have not only made twice as much manure as 

 others^ with equal means^ hut have so appropriated it, as 

 to get twice the return for the sam,e amount^ thus quadru- 

 pling the actual return for the whole. 



400. Now what shall the farmer do with these ma- 

 nures ? We will begin with the solid excrements un- 

 der the stable windows, premising, however, that there 

 ought to have been none such, for there ought to 

 have been mixed with the manure in the stables at 

 least an equal amount of dried peat or something of 

 the kind, by which all the liquid would have been ab- 

 sorbed, instead of running away into the ground. We 

 might go farther, and say that there ought to have 

 been a barn cellar, in which all the manure, solid and 

 liquid, together with as much dried peat, mud or rich 

 loam, should have been finely composted together, 

 and that a little plaster should have been thrown on, 

 from time to time, to check the too rapid fermenta- 

 tion and to fix the ammonia, thus bringing the ma- 

 nure into the right state to be used, exactly at the 



