2 On the Employment of Salt as a Manure. 



the employment of salt as a manure is not a modern recom- 

 mendation is proved unequivocally by the 34th and 35th verses 

 of the 14th chapter of St. Luke's gospel: and of perhaps all 

 the writers upon rural subjects through succeeding ages, not 

 one has escaped to us but mentions salt as a fertilizer of the 

 around, or as useful in some form or other to our crops. 

 Lord Bacon recommends it generally for the garden. Sir 

 Hugh Piatt eulogises it. for grass platts, and it is certain no 

 application tends more to keep their verdure permanent, or 

 to divest them of worms. Moses Cook, gardener to the 

 Earl of Essex, in 1679, says that salt to seed " is as sack to 

 a young child, a little doth a great deal of good." Switzer 

 recommends it for grass and for gravel walks ; " I would 

 have those," says Cook before mentioned, " that lay salt on 

 their gravel walks to kill their weeds, observe if in a few years 

 they do not produce more weeds than some other that had 

 not salt laid on them at all." Those who apply salt for this 

 purpose, as recommended also lately by Mr. Sinclair, author 

 of the invaluable Hortus Gramineus Woburnensis, must 

 repeat the application at least every other year ; if the salt is 

 not in excess it promotes the growth of the weeds. Salt is 

 a destroyer of moss on fruit trees, as long as it is present in 

 abundance, but if not applied every other year the moss 

 grows more luxuriant than ever. Hitt recommends it for 

 fruit trees. About Alresford in Hants it is generally applied 

 to onions. Mr. Knight recommends its use to late crops of 

 peas. Mr. G. Sinclair recommends it for carrots. W. Home, 

 Esq. and others eulogise its employment upon turnip lands. 

 The Rev. E. Cartwright, and others, have experienced its 

 benefits upon potatoes ; and were I to name every individual 

 who bears testimony to the same effect upon the above men- 

 tioned and other crops, and to detail only the results of their 

 experiments, I should trespass by far too much upon your 

 pages. In the absence of all experiment, there are some 

 plants under the gardener's immediate care, which, from a 

 knowledge of their habitats, we might feel convinced would 

 be benefited by the application of salt. The beet is a native 

 of the sea-shore, as is the sea kale and samphire : now all 

 these plants have been found benefited by the application of salt 

 when growing in our garden quarters. Lord Bacon especially 

 recommends it to beet ; and in a communication I have just 

 received from Sir T. D. Acland, Bart., of Killerton Park 

 near Exeter, his farmer advocates its use for mangel wurzel, 

 which is a member of the same botanical family. The cocoa 

 nut tree is said only to flourish in the vicinity of the sea, 



