488 [Assembly 



six times more tlian by the ordinary mode. The agriculturist 

 with it is fortified against drouth, and is always prepared to assist 

 his failing crops. It may be given in small or large quantities of 

 a proper quality. It is the only suitable manure for fodder 

 plants, as it never exhausts the soil Stock raisers should take 

 the greatest care of it, and always resort to liquid manure as the 

 basis of good cultivation. Pure water irrigation even Is of im- 

 mense value to drained lands. It deposits valuable earthy mat- 

 ters which cause rapid and luxuriant growth. There are various 

 ways of doing this, to wit : by submersion, filtration, regurgita- 

 tion, or subterranean irrigation. I have twenty-five acres of muck 

 land so drained and arranged that I can apply irrigation ad- 

 mirably by regurgitation, which consists in closing the mouths of 

 the two main drains. The consequence is that the water swells 

 back and rises to the roots of the crops, or covers them if re- 

 quired. The power derivable from prompt and proper applica- 

 tion of plain water to arable land cultivation, is almost unknown 

 to the agriculturists of America. If they would give up the 

 enormous expense incurred by making useless and disfiguring 

 fences, and apply a thousandth part of the money so expended 

 for the purchase of a proper steam engine, for the purposes of 

 threshing pulverizing stones for manure, grinding flour, cutting 

 wood, churning, crushing cobs, and distributing soluble manures 

 and plain water over one hundred acres of land, it would yield 

 them more profit than any farmer in the United States now de- 

 rives from three hundred badly tilled, wretchedly cultivated, and 

 magnificently fenced ati-es. The inhabitants of Belgium, Swit- 

 zerland, and many parts of Germany, are so well convinced of 

 the advantages of liquid manuring, that they convey it to the 

 fields in casks carried on their backs, whence they distribute it 

 by hand. The distribution by this means is at too high a state of 

 concentration owing to the inconvenience of increased bulk and 

 weight by proper dilution. Still they are well paid by the in- 

 crease of crops for all this excessive labor. Three tons of night 

 soil diluted with eighteen tons of w^ater has produced a more fer- 

 tilizing elTect than a top dressing of fourteen loads of stable ma- 

 nure. With solid manure used as a top dressing, the agricultur- 

 ist often spreads the larva of destructive insects, or prepares for 



