276 Report of Experiments on the Growth of Barley, 
Average Annual Produce without Manure. 
From the commencement, two plots, at some distance from 
one another, have been left unmanured ; and a third has received, 
every year, a dressing of ashes (burnt soil and turf), at the rate of 
20 bushels per acre per annum. This is much more than the 
quantity of the same description of ashes mixed with the various 
artificial manures to aid their even distribution over the land. 
The experiment was arranged to meet the cavil of Baron Liebig, 
that inasmuch as we had mixed " ashes" with our manures, we 
could not form any judgment as to the effects of the latter ; and 
that doubtless part of the effect we attributed to them was due 
to the "ashes" also employed. 
Table XXV. (see next page) gives the average annual pro- 
duce on these three practically unmanured plots, over the first 
ten, the second ten, and the total period of twenty years. 
Looking first to the quality of the produce, the average weight 
per bushel of dressed corn is, on all three plots, considerably 
higher, and the proportion of corn to straw is either higher, or 
but little lower, over the last than over the first 10 years. 
This result is doubtless due, in great measure, to the cha- 
racter of the seasons ; but the fact may be taken as at any rate 
sufficient evidence that there was no deterioration in the cha- 
racter or health of the plant, from growing the same crop year 
after year on the same land. 
The two unmanured plots, at opposite sides of the field, show 
an average annual difference, over 20 years, of 2 bushels of corn 
and ^ cwt. of straw, but considerably less over the last 10, than 
over the first 10 years. This indicates probably, that the result 
is, in part, at any rate, due to a difference of condition from pre- 
vious manuring and cropping, which is becoming gradually 
reduced, and so the plots the more equalised. It is a question, 
however, whether the staple may not be rather better on Plot 6—1 
than on Plot 1 O. 
On the other hand, the average produce on Plot 6-2, receiving 
annually 20 bushels of soil and turf ashes per acre, is only 
precisely the same in corn, and even rather less in straw, than 
on the immediately adjoining plot (6-1), which is entirely un- 
manured. Over the first 10 years, indeed, the ashed plot gave 
rather less, both corn and straw, than the entirely unmanured one, 
though rather more of both over the second 10 years. Possibly, 
therefore, under the exhausting process of growing the crop year 
after year on the same land, the small amount of manurial 
matters supplied in the ashes may eventually — that is after, so to 
speak, all the previously acquired condition is worked out of the soil 
