374 Transactions of the American Institute. 



insj season. The compost consisted of the sediment that was taken 

 out of a large pond for several seasons, mixed with as much quick- 

 lime as imparted a heat to the entire mass. This sediment was a 

 manure of itself, and, even without mixing with the lime, it prob- 

 ably formed one of the best dressings that could be placed on pas- 

 ture land. 



To insure regularity and evenness in spreading, and to make 

 absolutely certain that no portion of the field shall get more than 

 another, it is well worth while sending a man with a horse and 

 small seeding plow to mark the field into squares, previous to the 

 lime being brought; he will mai'k from ten to fifteen acres a da}-, 

 according to the distance considered most suitable; and the satis- 

 faction of having it regularly laid on, and that without the slightest 

 trouble, will more than doubly compensate for the time occupied 

 in marking it off. After repeated trials, we find twenty-five feet to 

 be a very convenient distance for laying down, as the men in spread- 

 ing have no difficulty in thi'owing it out twelve and a half feet, and 

 scarcely require to shift theii" position to do so. The number of 

 heaps required for a statute acre at this distance is seventy, and the 

 quantity to be given per acre, whether more or less, can be easily 

 apportioned by making a greater or less number of heaps of each 

 load, as the shells are being placed on the land. Supposing the 

 quantity intended to be given per acre to be four and a half tons — 

 which is a very fair dressing on light friable soils — the number of 

 loads required will be six, of fifteen hundred weight each. Each 

 load thrown out on the land in twelve little heaps gives seventy- 

 two, which brings the weight of shells per acre just as near the 

 required quantity as there is any occasion for, a hundred weight 

 more or less making no diflereuce, and exercising no perceptible 

 efiect on such a large area as 4,840 square yards. If a larger 

 dressing is intended, the number of falls to each load can, of 

 course, be lessened; and if smaller, correspondingly increased; the 

 quantity laid on being thus simply managed, without any interfer- 

 ence with the original marking. When placed upon the land, the 

 shells should at once be trimmed nicely together, and the heaps 

 balanced or equalized by taking a few stones from these heaps that 

 appear to be rather large, and placing them on those that are small, 

 so as to insure uniformity in spreading, as in the hurry of drawing 

 them from the carts it is nearly impossible to have the falls equal. 

 This being done satisfactorily, the lime can at once be mixed with 

 a few shovelfuls of damp earth, and a sprinkling thrown over the 



