COFFEE PLANTERS’ MANUAL. 53 
PicktE No. 2. 
Sal-ammoniac, 20 lb.; Common Salt 20 1b.; 10 gallons 
of Ferment, filled to 300 gallons with water. 20 1b. of 
Saltpetre may be added if easily procurable, but it may 
be omitted with very little detriment. 
Add any fresh Cattle Manure that is to be had. 
Notre.—The salts should be thoroughly dissolved in a 
sufficient quantity of the water before mixing them with 
the other ingredients. 
Remarks. 
Thug, in about 20 or 25 days from the commencement 
of operation, there will be made a heap of most valuable 
manure, which ought to be sufficient for four acres of 
coffee at the rate of 4 bushel for each tree, but, of course, 
the quantity must depend upon the more or less exhausted 
condition of the soil. 
The object of the above process is in the first place 
to hasten decay in the vegetable matter by artificially excit< 
ing fermentation, and the chemical changes dependent 
upon that action. This effected, the other materia!s which 
the vegetatable matter does not possess iu sufficient quanti- 
ty for the coffee tree are then added, and in a manner 
that prevents their dissipation or loss. The whole mass 
is thus brought into the condition most suitable for being 
taken up by the roots of the tree. Cattle manure is of 
course the best form under which nutriment can be fur- 
nished to most fruit-bearing trees; and the compost as 
above made is a tolerably close imitativn of cattle man- 
ure. It must be borne in mind that cattle discharge no 
materials as manure—either excrement or urine—which 
they have not previously taken in with their food. The 
vegetable matter which forms the basis of this artificial 
manure being however inferior in quality to what cattle 
generally consume, and being rather deficiest, although not 
altogether wanting, in some materials, these are added 
ina manner not only most economical, but also calculated 
to preserve them from loss. The cattle manure used is 
included not only for its own inherent value, but for assisting, 
by a well-known chemical law, the assimilation of other 
materials to the same condition as itself. A few cattle 
will sufficiently answer this purpose, although the amount 
of their manure if used alone would be of little avail, 
The cow is a small natural laboratory in which chemical 
changes are continually going on; and tke heap above 
‘described is, for the purposes of manure making, an-artificial 
imitation of the cow or a large scale. Rather, it should 
be said, the heap closely resembles so much farm-yard 
manure—that it consists of a supply of carbonaceous matter 
in the condition most suitable for supplying the plants 
with this prime necessary ; with the salts (both of excre- 
ment and utine) universally, equally, and in sufficient 
quantity diffused throughout the mass, 
_ CISTERNS is the next point on which I consider a 
tew additional observations desirable. There are vari- 
