70 
THE SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR. 
Manures. 
We extract the lollowing excellent remarks 
from an article appearing in the South Carolina 
Temperance Adtmcate: 
In the application ol manure we should have 
an eye to its permanent benefits. We should 
guard against its waste : and that method is to 
be preferred which best secures us against this. 
There is a popular opinion that manure sinks; 
that although it may be wasted, to a certain ex- 
tent, by evaporation, the principal waste is occa- 
sioned by its actually descending into the earth, 
by the action of rains, until it gets beyond the 
region occupied by the roots of the crops to be 
cultivated, and ceases to do them any good. 
If this were so, to any practical extent, it 
would be a very good thing: for it would deepen 
the soil ; and we should have nothing to do but 
to plow deep, and turn up the manure again 
before it sinks too far; when it would have its 
former effect upon the crop, until it should sink 
a second time. And this operation might be 
again repeated, with the like beneficial results. 
It would follow, too, that the pervious soil would 
;e the most valuable for manuring; because it 
;ould sooner and more easily be made deep. 
But is the popular opinion true, that manure 
’s wasted by sinking? I shall proceed, in the 
arst place, to prove that it is not; and then, to 
show the wrong practices that have flowed from 
it, and will continue to flow from it, so long as 
it holds possession of the popular mind. 
That manure does not sink beyond a proper 
depth, may be easily ascertained by very sim ple 
experiments and by a very little reflection. 
Let any one who doubts, put a spigot in a 
common cider barrel, knock out the head of it, 
and fill it with clean sand, nearly to the top. 
Then let him pour upon the sand the most im- 
pure liquid manure he can find. He will be 
able to "draw from the spigot nearly pure water. 
The impurities, which constitute the manure, 
will have been detained by the sand, by filtra- 
tion, within a short distance of the top of the 
barrel. 
It is upon this principle that farmers are in 
the habit of clarifying their cider. It is also a 
well known method among grocers for freeing 
their liquors of objectionable matter; and every 
confectioner habitually employs it in his busi- 
ness. 
If we look to the operations of nature, we 
shall recognise it there. If the impurities, on 
or near the surface of the earth, were carried 
down by rains, we should never be able to get 
a palatable drink of water. But the beneficent 
Parent of all good, has, in the beautiful arrange- 
ments of an all-wise Providence, so ordered it, 
that the rain which descends upon the surface 
«f the earth, shall be drained of all its own im- 
purities, and of those it encounters near the sur- 
face, by passing through the superior strata ; and 
h gushes out, pure and transparent, in refresh- 
ing springs and wells. 
I take it for granted, that whoever bestows a 
Jittle reflection upon these things will be con- 
vinced, that the opinion that manure sinks be- 
neath the reach of the roots of cultivated plants, 
is entirely erroneous. 
It is an indubitable fact, however, that after a 
time, manure does cease to produce any sensi- 
ble effects? I think it occurs by evaporation. 
Perhaps a lew simple experiments will estab- 
lish this. 
If you enclose a portion of manure in a box, 
and place it where it shall not be exposed to the 
action of light and heat, it will retain its fertil- 
izing qualities, for almost any assignable 
time ; and will even acquire, from the atmos- 
phere, (if accessible to it,) an addition to them. 
But, if you place it on a board or stone, or in a 
tin box, open at the top, but enclosed at the 
sides, (a method which I select, as rendering it 
certain that no part can sink, though it may es- 
cape at the top,) and then expose it to the rain 
and sun, or to the sun alone, it will, in a very 
?horf time, become entirely inert, and its escape 
A’ill be rapid in proportion to the intensity of the 
heat to which it is subjected. 
There are other proofs. Every body has ob- 
served the rapid deterioration of land, exposed 
to the sun, without the benefit of trees, or of a 
crop, to shade it. 
Having thus learned that manure is not wast- 
ed by but by this may be 
the proper place to inquire the reason of the well 
known fact, that, when covered at the same 
depth, it is wasted sooner in sandy than in clay 
land. This depends upon the superior heat of 
the one over the other ; which, of course, causes 
a more rapid evaporation. And this, again, 
may be ascertained by a simple experiment. 
If, at any given hour of a summer day, you 
insert a thermometer in two contiguous soils, 
one abounding in sand and the other in clay, or 
insert it in two boxes, the one filled \vith sand, 
the other with clay, you will find the tempera- 
ture of the former to be several degrees higher 
than that of the other. The necessary inference 
from this I havm already stated. 
We have now seen the popular notion of 
manure sinking, is an error. That on the con- 
trary, it evaporates. We have seen that this 
arises from heat; and that this abounds more in 
sand than in clay. 
The universal practice, which has followed 
that popular erroneous opinion, has been to de- 
posit manure shallow in the sand, from an ap- 
prehension that it might sink, and, of course, 
would sink more rapidly in that kind of soil, 
which is more pervious than in clay, whish is 
less so. And so long as this abstract notion that 
manure sinks, prevails, so long will this prac- 
tice prevail, as the necessary consequence of it. 
I have shown that manure does not sink, but 
evaporates: and evaporates more rapidly from 
sand than from clay. What is the necessary 
inference ? Is it not that the practice of making 
a shallower deposit in sand than in clay, should be 
EXACTLY REVERSED? The danger of evapora- 
tion being greater in the former than in the lat- 
ter, the deposit should be deeper to avoid it. 
1 might extend this paper by other practical 
remarks and inferences; as, for instance: that 
the evaporation of manures being established, 
it is of importance in all cases where other cir- 
cumstances will permit, to deposit them deeply, 
not only with a view to the permanent improve- 
ment of the soil, but to prevent the unhealthy 
contamination of the air by the deleterious gases 
escaping, by evaporation, from the fertilizing 
matter. Liebig’s work, and that beautiful little 
treatise, Popular Vegetable Physiology might 
have been consulted with advantage by all, but 
I would particularly recommend the latter as 
containing the science of the former in a more 
attractive form, and in a style level with the 
plainest understanding. Coatswood. 
MAKING COMPOST. 
Capt. Abel Moore’s Statement to the Committee of the 
Sliddlesex (Mass.) Society. 
The importance of manure to the farmer is 
so apparent, that the manner of increasing it, in 
quantity and quality, without reducing the value 
of the same, becomes a matter of interest to all 
who are engaged in agriculture; and it is a 
well established fact, that manure can be more 
profitably used as a compost, than in any other 
way. 
My attention was particularly drawn to the 
subject of making compost manure, about five 
years since, for at that time I could not pur- 
chase stable manure, without paying more for 
it, than the real benefit derived from its use. 
About that time, I built a barn 80 feet long, by 
40 feet wide, with a cellar under the whole of it, 
and I then began making compost in a way that 
proved more pirofitable than I had previously 
found. 1 began by fixing troughs in ihe cellar, 
under the holes were I put down the manure, 
with hogsheads placed under the same to receive 
the urine from the cattle, and when full, I placed 
a bed of loam and peat mud and emptied the 
urine on to it, and set them again. 
I have alwa 3 ’s kept hogs in my barn cellar, 
and, for the last three years, have kept two yoke 
of oxen, seven cows, one bull, and two horses, 
through the year. I tie up the cattle in the barn 
every night to save the manure ; and in addi- 
tion to the above, I have usually wintered from 
twenty to twenty-five head of young and fat 
cattle, and oxen. 
For the last two years, I have adopted a new 
method, which I think is better than any other 
that 1 have tried. I always kept at hand a plen- 
ty of good loam and peat mud, both in my barn- 
cellar and barn yard. I have windows opening 
from the cellar into the yard, through which I 
put down most of the loam and mud, and place 
it under the holes where the manure is put 
down, and after it has remained there about one 
week, I spread it over the hog-styes in the cellar, 
which are 80 feet long by 24 feet wide; but be- 
fore spreading the loam or mud, I sow corn on 
it, which will cause the hogs to root and turn 
the whole over. 
So valuable do I consider urine for compost 
manure, that I have barrels placed in my sheds 
to receive the urine from the house, which are 
emptied on to the manure heaps when full ; and 
also, I have plank troughs made on runners, 
placed under two privies, and when they are 
partly full, I hitch on a yoke of oxen and draw 
them to the barn cellar, and bury the contents in 
the loam and mud. 
At intervals ol a few weeks, I mix in lime, 
salt and plaster, at the rate of about one bushel 
each of lime and salt and a bushel of plaster to 
a cord of the compost. Lime aids the fermen- 
tation, and the salt and plaster, I believe, have 
beneficial effects on most of my lands. 
1 always fork over my manure very light be- 
fore using it, and cast it out of the cellar and 
yard twice a year. 
There can be no better economy in the making 
of compost manure, than by adopting a course 
of using the urine of cattle to the best advan- 
tage. Filling up the hog pens with loam and 
mud at about the same time, and allowing it to 
remain until it is w’anted for use, does not, in my 
opinion, answer so good a purpose as putting 
the loam, &c. in as fast as it becomes saturated 
with urine. In the one way, your compost is 
well mixed with the droppings and urine of the 
cattle, and in the other the droppings are all on 
lop before it is forked over, and but partially 
saturated with the urine. 
The urine of cattle, I think, possesses as 
strong and enriching qualities, when properly 
applied to loam or mud, as their droppings. 
Peat mud can be easily rotted and fit for mak- 
ing compost, by digging the same in the sum- 
mer or fall of the year, throwing it into moderate 
sized heaps and allowing it to freeze and thaw 
during the wdnter. 
Very truly yours, &c. Abel Moore. 
From the New York Farmer. 
The dung of horses, sheep, and of cattle gen- 
erally, act as fertilizers only in proportion as 
they are combined with certain soils. On sandy, 
calcareous soil, they are very profitable — such ^ 
soils being deprived of the silicate of potash, 
and of the phosphate; while on a dry soil, rich 
in potash, or on a soil formed of the ruins of I 
granite, of porphyry, or clingstone, these nra- i 
nures are of little value. On the contrary, pou- i 
drette is an excellent fertilizer of such soils. 
The efficacy of urine as a manure is well 
known in Flanders. In China, the people are 
prohibited by law from throwing that and the 
excrement away. China is the country of ex- 
periment; ages have given to the people discov- 
eries of all sorts, w’hich Europe achieved, but 
could not imitate; for the Chinese books give 
no scientific accounts; they give mere receipts 
for their operations. The last halt century has, 
however, given us not only the knowledge which 
enables us to equal them in many arts, but to 
surpass them ; and this advance among us is 
due to the judicious application of chemistrv. 
But how far in the rear is our agriculture still, 
when compared with the Chinese. Thev are 
admirable gardeners; they know how to give 
each plant its prcrper education ; to prepare for 
it its appropriate soil. Among them agiiculture 
has attained the highest degree of perfection. 
In that country, which differs from ours in natu- 
ral fertility of soil, they attach verj’ little impor- 
