No. 151.] 379 



tain the water, by carting some hundreds of loads of muck from it to 

 a heap hard by; I then commenced ditching from it as the centre to 

 all parts of the field, the stones were made use of for that purpose; 

 and when completed there were under drains, built of stones in the 

 most approved manner, leading to all parts of the land, the field con- 

 taining about four acres; the advantages were, 1st. The ground was 

 perfectly drained, and yielded the first season after, potatoes, corn, and 

 buckwheat". 2d. A pond was formed 14 feet deep and 600 feet long 

 which is now stocked with trout, perch, carp, and gold fish. 3d. 

 The muck taken out, mixed with oyster shell lime, was worth the 

 entire cost of the improvement, as manure. In the spring I intend 

 to draw upon this field six hundred bushels of unslaked lime in the 

 manner following: I will deposit it in small heaps of five bushels 

 each throughout the field at reasonable distances apart, when the heaps 

 become sufficiently slaked to reduce the lime to powder, it shall be 

 spread equally over the land, and immediately plowed until it be- 

 comes thoroughly incorporated with the earth; this field will then 

 produce an abundant crop of any kind of grain that may be sovv'n 

 upon it, and will be permanently fertile, as the humus in such a soil 

 is very abundant. A few years since I placed a quantity of lime on 

 a corner of this same field, which was then cold and wet; I could 

 see no improvement in that portion over any other part of the field, 

 and came to the conclusion that generally speaking, lime was of no 

 service on a wet soil; still Mr. Wilkins was eminently successful on 

 such a soil, obtaining 56 bushels of rice per acre, where rice never 

 grew before ; circumstances and climate, might have had some effect. 

 Lime is apt to liberate gases, and other volatile substances contained 

 in a soil, therefore it would not be advisable to pursue a course of 

 liming for many years in succession, as you might destroy a good 

 soil by so doing. On ordinary tillable land, an application of three 

 hundred bushels per acre, would be sufficient to last 20 years. I 

 have heard farmers on the Hudson remark, that lime was valueless 

 for agricultural purposes, and injurious to their farms; the reason 

 was, that the. calcined magnesia of the lime stone remained for along 

 period of time after its application, in a caustic state, unfit to absorb 

 carbonic acid gas from the air, and in this state nothing can possibly 

 be more crisadvantageous to all growing vegetables and plants. After 

 remaining a long time in the soil, it finally absorbs the carbonic acid 

 gas of the atmosphere, when it becomes carbonate of magnesia, and 

 in this form is particularly valuable as forming a part of plants ; all 

 very fertile soils contain it. 



