21G 



The experiments made at Rugby were conducted by Mr. Lawes, a manu- 

 facturer of artificial manures, and a well-known agriculturalist, who was also 

 at the time, a member of a royal commission appointed to make experiments 

 and report their results. They were therefore carefully conducted, and the 

 following were the values assigned : — 



£15 per acre being the value of the milk derived from one acre of 

 ordinary meadow grass, £25, £33, and £36, were the values derived from the 

 same grass when watered with 3000, 6000, and 9000 tons of sewage per acre. 

 From the use therefore of 1000 tons of sewage, we get a result varying from 

 £3 6s. 8d. to £2 6s. 8d. over and above th<> amount that would have been 

 produced by the natural grass, assuming milk to be worth Id. per pint. This 

 gives the sewage an average value of from "8d. to - 55d. per ton. The sewage 

 which had been used was found by analysis to contain from 15 to 25 per cent, 

 of its manurial properties, owing to the nature of the soil and the slope of the 

 ground, and it might have been advantageously used a second time. 



In Edinburgh the results have been more satisfactoiy with regard to the 

 money value per acre. There the meadows are annually let or sold, the pur- 

 chasers generally cutting the grass for themselves, at prices varying from £25 

 to £40 per acre ; and at Leith, where the sewage is used a second time, at £30 

 per acre. 



These results ai-e, however, obtained by the use of very large quantities of 

 sewage, as much as 20,000 tons per acre being applied, although its actual 

 manurial value is not equivalent to more than half that of ordinary sewage, as 

 the Foul Burn, by which it is brought down, drains a large area of open 

 country. 



At Croydon, after paying rent at the rate of £4 per acre, the gross value 

 of the sewage is returned at from f d. to Id., for Italian rye-grass, per ton, 

 used. 



The results obtained by Lord Essex at Watford, by Sir J. Paxton at the 

 Crystal Palace, and by Mr. Mechi, and others, do not admit of accurate com- 

 parison, an exaggerated value having been put upon sewage as a manure, and 

 consequently the outlay upon pipes, pumps, and apparatus, has usually been 

 upon far too large a scale. 



In the case of the farm now about to be described, it should be borne in 

 mind that the object for which the farm was worked, was not so much to pay 

 a dividend, as to prove definitely the actual value per ton of sewage delivered 

 on a farm, and for what sum per acre a certain quantity of sewage could be 

 economically made available. 



So far, the three principal methods of irrigation have been the catch- 

 water, the ridge and furrow, and the hose and jet. These names almost 

 explain themselves ; but that there may be no mistake, I may explain, that 

 the catch-water is a system of contour ditches communicating with main 

 feeders, each ditch acting as a drain to the plot of land lying above, and a 

 feeder to that below. 



The ridye and furrow is commonly used when the natural fall of the land 

 is too slight for the catch- water system, and can frequently be made use of in 

 conjunction with, and prior to it. It consists of a series of artificial undula- 

 tions about 60 yards wide, having a fall of 1 in 140, or thereabouts. 



The hose and jet is a system of underground pipes, under pressure, having 

 valves at intervals, and junctions to which the hose is affixed, the hose itself 

 travelling on a light carriage to prevent injury to the crop. There is also 

 another system occasionally made use of, viz., wooden or iron troughs, but it 

 is usually auxiliary to the other methods of distribution. In the present 

 example the ridge and furrow, and the catch- water, were the systems employed. 

 The area brought under their operation amounted to about seventy acres, and 



