Report on the Agriculture of Belgium. 
15 
the manure, in spite of the injury done to the poor panting boasts 
who wearily tramp about in search of an exit from an atmosphere 
of ammonia*. 
The drainings from tlie manure-house are carefully collected 
in tanks, as also are all other descriptions of liquid. The 
steading- on one farm of sixty acres was furnished with the 
following tanks, each fitted with a separate pump : — 
1. Receiving liquid refuse' om the scullery. 
2. Receiving liquid manure from the stables and cowsheds. 
3. Receiving the drainings from the covered midden ; these 
are afterwards used for washing out the stables, &c., 
and then go into No. 2. 
4. Receiving the overflow of the drainings, and any excess 
of water in rainy weather ; this is used on the mea- 
dows. 
The above is a fair representative of the system adopted, and 
of the extraordinary anxiety with which the Flemish farmer 
attempts to save every particle of liquid manure ;t but we were 
heterodox enough to think that respecting some portion at least 
of these appliances "/e jeu nen vaut pas la chandelle.^' The 
* I have shown in my paper on the ' Composition of Farmyard Manure,' and 
the changes it undergoes on keeping (see the ' Journal,' vol. xvii., part 1), that 
neither fresh nor rotten dung contains an appreciable amount of free ammonia ; that 
under good management, dung loses none of its essential fertilising constituents ; and 
that neither sun nor wind expels any volatile ammonia compounds from dung. 
It appears, therefore, quite unnecessary to keep dung in closed buildings. In 
localities where much rain falls, and a sufficient amount of litter cannot be used to 
absorb the liquid portion of the manure, it is advisable to have the manure-steading 
roofed in, and tlie sides open; but where sufficient litter can be spared in the 
making of the manure to retain, even in rainy weather, the liquid portion, it is 
even unnecessary to put a roof over the dung-pit. No loss in fertilising matter is 
experienced when dung is carted and spread upon the field as soon as it is possible 
to do so after it is produced. 
The Belgian system of keeping farmyard-manure in closed buildings for a con- 
siderable length of time ; the abundant use of water in its preparation, and the 
partial separation into liquid and solid dung, does not commend itself to our view 
as worthy of imitation. 
This system entails unnecessary expense in the construction of closed buildings, 
tanks, and labour for pumping, carting, and distributing separately the liquid and 
solid manure, and affords a far less effectual safeguard against loss in fertilising 
matter than the plan of carting and spreading the manure on the fields so soon as 
it can be done after it comes from the stables or cowsheds ; for, however well 
liquid-manure tanks may have been constructed, it is next to impossible to confine 
in them entirely large quantities of liquids; and it is by the draining away of the 
liquid, the most valuable portion of manure, and not by evaporating to tlie air or 
sun, that farmyard-manure sustains any loss in fertilising matter. — A. V. 
t On farms where fattening stock is kept, the best plan of making and keeping 
manure unquestionably is to make it in boxes, a plan which is rarely seen in 
operation in Belgium. The Belgian farmer, as a rule, is anxious to obtain as 
much liquid manure as possible, and for this reason rather invites than prevents 
the rains, which fall from the unguttered roofs of the farm buildings to find their 
way into the midden. — A. V. 
