24 The Best Means of applying Liquid Manure. 
great advantage. As the quantity of liquid-manure depends upon 
the number of stock feeding, and the number of the stock upon 
the quantity of food produced, the crops that will produce the 
most rapid succession of cuttings must be the best. Italian rye- 
grass stands pre-eminent in this respect, and is peculiarly adapted 
for the purpose ; indeed, the liquid-manure system hangs upon 
it, as it is the only grass that will give us a regular supply of 
highly-nutritious and profitable food for stock, without cultiva- 
tion and re-sowing, and which requires no hay, straw, or other 
food to be given along with it. 
I found on all these farms that the grain-crops did not require 
any manure ; in fact, they were rather inclined to be over- 
luxuriant after Italian ryegrass used for soiling. The ryegrass 
is always cut before it has fully shot into ear, so that it does 
not absorb the grain- producing elements from the soil, but allows 
them to accumulate for the benefit of future crops : thus the 
land is left clean and full of grain-producing strength. The best 
crop to follow the ryegrass is early sown oats, as it is less liable 
than others to be injured by over-luxuriance ; and is benefited 
by deep ploughing, ; which should be done on the Kentish 
principle, of complete inversion of the furrow-slice. After the 
oats wheat will be sure to be both productive and of good 
quality : it requires the land to be shallow-ploughed ; thus the 
turf will be left buried, and what was the under-soil will remain 
exposed to atmospheric action. With the wheat clover-seed is sown 
and hoed in during April. This clover is to be dunged during 
the winter, and mown twice for hay the following summer, then 
ploughed shallow for wheat, after which the land is ploughed 
moderately deep for barley ; a deeply-cultivated and highly- 
manured crop of turnips is next taken, and the land is then laid 
down for two years in Italian ryegrass. By this rotation an 
abundance both of grain and of beef and mutton will be pro- 
duced at moderate expense for purchased manures. Close obser- 
vation, and two years' experience in the liquid-manure system, 
have convinced me that only green crops, especially Italian rye- 
grass, are benefited to a paying extent by the application of 
liquid-manure in a dilute form; indeed, when we reflect that it 
is in our driest districts that the most abundant crops and best 
quality of grain are produced, it is evident that it is only the 
green crops that can give a direct return for the capital invested 
in liquid-manure apparatus. As the apparatus is therefore only 
applicable during a portion of the rotation, the great desideratum 
is to discover some mode of diminishing the amount of capital 
required for the first outlay, as well as to endeavour, by a better 
mode of application, to reduce the expense of distributing the 
manure ; and if at the same time we can reduce to a minimum 
the wear and tear of hose, &c., still more profit will follow. 
